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Stage 12 of the 2012 Giro d'Italia was contested on 17 May, and the race concluded with Stage 21 on 27 May. The second half of the race was situated entirely within Italy; starting with a medium mountain stage from Seravezza to Sestri Levante, before the customary race-concluding time trial was held in Milan. Following his victory in the tenth stage, 's Joaquim Rodríguez held the lead into the second half of the race. He maintained his lead on stage 12 – after the breakaway succeeded in staying away until the end of the stage as rider Lars Bak held on to win by eleven seconds ahead of the remnants of the breakaway group – and on stage 13, as Mark Cavendish picked up his third stage victory of the race on one of the few sprinter-suited stages during the second half of the race. Rodríguez gave up the lead of the race at the end of stage 14, after rider Ryder Hesjedal attacked on the climb to the stage finish at Cervinia – the first that the climb had featured in the Giro since 1997 – taking 26 seconds out of his rival, and reclaimed the ''maglia rosa'' that he held for three days in the first half of the race. Rodríguez immediately retook the lead of the race the following day at the summit finish at the ''Pian dei Resinelli''. Although he finished second to rider Matteo Rabottini on the day, Rodríguez gained 39 seconds on Hesjedal through his late-stage attack. After the race's second rest day which came after that stage, the gap between Rodríguez and Hesjedal remained at the half-minute mark for the next three stages; the breakaway succeeded once again on stage 16 as rider Jon Izagirre soloed away from a group of riders in the closing stages, while on stage 17, Rodríguez won the stage after a group of the leading overall contenders escaped on the ''Passo Giau''. Also among that group were Hesjedal, former winners Ivan Basso () and Michele Scarponi (), with rider Rigoberto Urán and 's Domenico Pozzovivo making up the sextet. Stage 18 saw the sprinters' last chance of victory with Andrea Guardini of edging out Cavendish for victory. Hesjedal and Rodríguez took near-identical gaps out on one another during stages 19 and 20; Hesjedal reduced the lead to 17 seconds in the former stage finishing at the ''Alpe di Pampeago'', while Rodríguez moved it back out to 31 seconds following the Cima Coppi finish at the Stelvio Pass. rider Thomas De Gendt moved into overall podium contention by winning the stage to the Stelvio, taking between three and five minutes from all of the other overall contenders, and moved from ninth place to fourth place at the end of the stage. Hesjedal's better time trial abilities enabled him to take the lead of the race on the final day from Rodríguez; he overturned the 31-second deficit, and ultimately became the first Canadian rider to win a Grand Tour. Hesjedal had turned the deficit into a 16-second margin of victory, the closest such margin since Eddy Merckx beat Gianbattista Baronchelli by 12 seconds in the 1974 edition of the race. De Gendt moved ahead of Scarponi for third place, to become the first Belgian rider to finish on a Grand Tour podium since Johan Bruyneel finished third at the 1995 Vuelta a España. ==Stage 12== ;17 May 2012 — Seravezza to Sestri Levante, The stage had been scheduled to be held over a distance of , but in April 2012, prior to the start of the Giro, the itinerary was changed slightly to . Due to torrential rains which caused floods and mudslides in October 2011, the roads through the Cinque Terre were considered unusable for the race. As such, the second half of the race began with an undulating stage along the Ligurian coast, with four categorised climbs over the parcours, the last of which coming just from the stage finish in Sestri Levante.〔 Mini-attacks set the course for the stage as the field remained as one, for much of the first hour of racing; it was not until after that the stage's primary breakaway had been formed. An initial move of seven riders representing seven different teams went clear, with the septet later joined by two more riders, Jackson Rodríguez () and 's Martijn Keizer, the latter again making it into the breakaway move. 's Sandy Casar was the best-placed of the nine riders in the group, trailing overnight leader Joaquim Rodríguez () by four minutes, and as the stage wore on, became more of a threat to Rodríguez's lead. The breakaway's gap surpassed that figure, reaching a high of seven minutes, with remaining on the stage. As set the pace on the front of the peloton, rider Michał Gołaś soloed off the front of the lead group, but he was caught prior to the summit of the day's final climb, the ''Villa Tassani''.〔 More attacks occurred between the leaders prior to the finish, but Lars Bak produced the decisive attack with remaining,〔 and eventually went clear to an 11-second winning margin at the finish,〔 winning his first individual Giro stage. Casar led a group of six riders across in second, but his time gap to the peloton was only 3' 23". Despite the twelve bonus seconds on offer for second at the line, Casar was still 26 seconds shy of taking the race lead,〔 but moved into third in the general classification, behind Rodríguez and 's Ryder Hesjedal. |} 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「2012 Giro d'Italia, Stage 12 to Stage 21」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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