Nicolas Prodhomme takes stunning Giro d'Italia Stage 19 victory as Carapaz and Del Toro duel

Nicolas Prodhomme has won stage 19 of the 2025 Giro d’Italia on a monster day of climbing, with a superb attack. He beat the main GC men, as Richard Carapaz and Isaac Del Toro put more time into Simon Yates.

Stage 19 of the race burst into action almost immediately, with Wout van Aert launching the first attack as the peloton hit the base of Croce Serra. It set the tone for a chaotic and aggressive day in the mountains, with a breakaway of over 30 riders eventually forming, including key names like Carlos Verona, Louis Meintjes, Romain Bardet, Antonio Tiberi and Pello Bilbao.

The day’s terrain offered no respite, with the peloton already fragmenting early on the slopes of Col Tzecore. Multiple riders including Tom Pidcock, Max Poole and Thymen Arensman were dropped as UAE and EF Education–EasyPost set a fierce pace behind. By the time the race reached Col Saint-Pantaléon, the gap to the front had grown to over three minutes, despite several reshuffles within the breakaway.

Scaroni took the KOM points at the top of Tzecore, continuing Astana’s relentless pursuit of the blue jersey. With just under 60km remaining, the break had whittled down to ten riders, and eventually a trio of Tiberi, Prodhomme, and Verona surged clear, carving out a 30 second gap over the other four chasers as they sprinted through the Red Bull kilometre marker.

Meanwhile, the peloton had been reduced to around 20 riders, with Visma and UAE alternating control on the front. Carapaz found himself isolated with no teammates, while young Red Bull – BORA – Hansgrohe rider Georg Steinhauser remained stuck in no man’s land between the groups.

With less than 30km to go, Tiberi was dropped from the break, leaving just Verona and Prodhomme as the front two. Then, it was Prodhomme who attacked, but with the peloton just 1 minute behind at that point, he’d need a miracle to come out on top. A big surprise came when Adam Yates was dropped, clearly not on his best day, as he was unable to support Del Toro.

With 21km to go, the first attacks of the GC men came. And the first came from Richard Carapaz, with Simon Yates and Isaac Del Toro straight onto his wheel, with Derek Gee close behind. But it seemed to just be a tester attack, as before long Rafal Majka was back at the front doing what he does best, controlling the peloton.

With 12.6km to go, Prdohomme’s lead was 1:24, but would that be enough? The answer seemed to be yes, as with 8km to go he had increased that margin to 1:39 minutes. What was becoming more and more clear, was that fatigue was really starting to affect the bunch, as most of the GC men appeared to be more concerned about losing time, than gaining time.

Then, with 6.7km to go, finally Carapaz attacked again, but once more Isaac Del Toro was on his wheel. Where was Simon Yates? It looked like his pink jersey dreams were up, as he instead reacted to attack from Derek Gee, with the Canadian gunning for his podium spot. Carapaz kept digging and the gap to the Yates group grew to 30 seconds, but Del Toro, as he has done all race, looked so smooth and relaxed on the bike. Eerily similar to another UAE rider in pink 12 months ago…

In the end there was no stopping Nicolas Prodhomme. He took the win, whilst the GC battle will continue until tomorrow. For now, ISaac del Toro is looking good for the maglia rosa.