page_title: 2011 Ag2r–La Mondiale season
section_title: Giro d'Italia
hierarchical_section_title: 2011 Ag2r–La Mondiale season / Grand Tours / Giro d'Italia
caption_attribution_description: English: w:John Gadret at the w:2011 Giro d'Italia
context_page_description: The 2011 season for the Ag2r–La Mondiale cycling team began in January at the Tour de San Luis and ended in October at the Chrono des Nations. As a UCI ProTeam, they were automatically invited and obligated to send a squad to every event in the UCI World Tour.
  Ag2r had a meager 2011 season, managing only six victories. The pinnacle of the team's season was certainly the Giro d'Italia. John Gadret, one of the team's leaders, won the undulating 11th stage to Castelfidardo. Though he was outclassed by the race's truly elite riders, particularly so by Giro champion Alberto Contador, he finished the race in fourth place overall, easily the best final placing in a Grand Tour in the team's history. Hubert Dupont also rode very strongly in this race, to 12th place overall and some high stage placings as well.
  While the team got several top tens in single-day races from Anthony Ravard, the only such race they actually won was the lightly heralded Châteauroux Classic. They finished second-to-last in the UCI World Tour rankings, better only than Vacansoleil–DCM.
context_section_description: Ag2r's squad for the Giro d'Italia had as its leader Gadret, the 13th-place finisher in the 2010 Giro who aimed to improve upon that placing and ride to a top ten finish. Dessel and Nocentini were named to the squad to aim for stage wins and breakaway representation. The team's showing in the stage 1 team time trial was mediocre at best, as they came home 16th of the 23 teams, 49 seconds off the winning pace set by HTC–Highroad. Montaguti finished near the front of the field in the Giro's first two road races, taking tenth in the mass sprint finish to stage 2, and likewise tenth in stage 3 when the field was a little more split up. Gadret tried to bridge to the leader on the road (Martin Kohler) in stage 5 one of that stage's many dirt road sections, but he experienced mechanical trouble and finished well down on the day, losing almost a minute to the race's top riders. Gadret lay in 26th place after eight stages, which was the eve of the race's first summit finish, at Mount Etna.
  Gadret was ninth on Etna, losing over a minute to stage winner, new race leader, and eventual Giro champion Alberto Contador, but only 17 seconds to the race's other top riders, and he put in time to the vast majority of the field. The ride moved him up 11 places in the overall standings. Gadret showed his best form, and cunning, in stage 11. With Contador suggesting that he may tactically surrender the jersey on this stage, the expectation was that the victor would come from a member of the morning breakaway. Instead, the Lampre–ISD team mounted a strong chase to bring the breakaway riders back. Their leader Michele Scarponi later admitted that he had hoped to be the day's winner, but Gadret took the diminished peloton by surprise with a well-timed attack on the stage's final kilometer to claim the first Grand Tour stage win of his career.
  Gadret and Dupont then showed climbing prowess in the first of three consecutive high mountain stages that preceded the second rest day. While Contador and José Rujano were easily the strongest riders on the day, the Ag2r tandem broke away from the peloton behind and secured third and fourth positions on the day. Gadret was third, which afforded him a time bonus in addition to the actual time taken. This moved him into the top ten for the first time in the race, in eighth. Dupont also entered the top ten after this stage, at tenth place. With sixth place the next day on Monte Zoncolan and attrition to other riders, Gadret moved up further, to fifth place. Dupont finished eighth on this stage to move up to eighth overall. Gadret gained further time against the vast majority of the field in the Giro's queen stage, stage 15, by finishing fifth and moving up to fourth place in the overall standings. Dupont struggled, coming in 22nd on the day, to fall to 15th overall. Gadret finished the race in fourth place, holding it after each of the remaining stages. Dupont took back a little time against some of the other riders in the field in stages 17 and 20, to improve his final position to 12th. Gadret's fourth place was the team's best overall placement in a Grand Tour in their history, bettering the sixth place attained by Cyril Dessel in the 2006 Tour de France.
caption: John Gadret won a stage and finished fourth overall in the Giro, easily the best overall Grand Tour finish for both Gadret and the team.
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