page_title: 2010 Team HTC–Columbia season
section_title: Giro d'Italia
hierarchical_section_title: 2010 Team HTC–Columbia season / Grand Tours / Giro d'Italia
caption_attribution_description: Named cyclist at the en:2009 Tour Down Under team presentation
context_page_description: The 2010 season for Team HTC–Columbia began in January with the Tour Down Under and ended in October at the Giro di Lombardia. As a UCI ProTour team, they were automatically invited and obliged to send a squad to every event in the ProTour. The team's general manager was Bob Stapleton, in his third year with the team.
  With the team's focus shifting to full-time support of prolific sprinter Mark Cavendish, many riders left the team after the 2009 season, most for the new Team Sky. Several young riders, most of them in their first year at this level of the sport, joined the team to be members of Cavendish's new leadout train, which lacked Cavendish's primary leadout man from 2009, Mark Renshaw, for the first several months of the season due to Epstein-Barr virus. Cavendish's own training and development were also stunted because of a dental infection.
context_section_description: Team HTC-Columbia came to the Giro with a squad led by Greipel, the season's most prolific winner of individual days of racing and a heavy favorite in the Giro's flat stages, and Pinotti, who would try for a high overall placing and stage wins in the time trials. Pinotti was tenth in the stage 1 time trial in Amsterdam. Goss and Greipel both made all the splits occurring after many crashes marred stage 2. In the depleted sprint finish, the Australian took second despite entering the Giro prepared to be Greipel's leadout man. Greipel was fourth and did not seriously challenge stage winner Tyler Farrar. More crashes occurred in stage 3. Greipel again made all the selections, but again was not a factor in the sprint, taking just sixth on the day. The squad's best-placed rider prior the transfer to Italy was Sieberg in fifth, 7 seconds behind the race leader. With the squad noted as one of the favorites in the stage 4 team time trial, Sieberg, as well as Goss and Greipel both three seconds back of him, all had a realistic chance of taking the pink jersey. The squad finished the 32.5 km (20.2 mi) course with five riders together in 36'58". Goss and Greipel were among the five finishing together, but their 21-second gap to stage winners Liquigas–Doimo meant that the team missed out on getting the pink jersey.
  Stage 7 was difficult, long and run partially on unpaved roads. The day on which the stage was run happened to have very heavy rain, making the course muddy and still more treacherous. Pinotti rode with the leaders most of the day, following a move by Alexander Vinokourov after overnight race leader Vincenzo Nibali needed a bike change. Pinotti was not quite able to bridge up to the leading trio of Vinokourov, Damiano Cunego, and stage winner Cadel Evans in the final kilometer, finishing six seconds back for fourth on the day. The result moved him into sixth in the overall standings. The ninth stage was very flat, without any categorized hills. Garmin–Transitions forced a grueling pace in the final kilometers, which led to a split in the field – only 47 riders finished together at the head of the field. Greipel had difficulties keeping the pace and was just 19th on the day. Goss rode at the front of the field intending to lead Greipel out, but when he saw that the big German was not at the front of the race with 400 m (1,300 ft) to go, he rode for himself and won the stage. The next day's stage was also flat, and Greipel again had troubles in the sprint, coming only seventh out of the nine riders who finished three seconds ahead of the rest of the peloton. In stage 11, when more than 50 riders formed the day's breakaway group, Goss was the only HTC-Columbia rider to make the selection. He did not come close to staying with the leaders, however, finishing just three seconds ahead of the peloton and with them nearly 13 minutes behind the stage winner. These results moved Pinotti out of the top ten overall. Pinotti took seventh in stage 12, when a late ten-man selection of General Classification favorites and hopefuls finished ten seconds ahead of the peloton. Lewis made a winning breakaway in stage 13. He attacked in the final kilometer and appeared poised for a stage win, but Manuel Belletti passed him up 100 m (330 ft) from the finish line.
  Greipel would normally have pulled out of the race well before its most difficult mountain stages took place, but having missed out on the sprints in the race's first two weeks, he rode through the high mountain stages 14 and 15 (which Pinotti finished among the top ten in both) and the Plan de Corones time trial with stage 18 in mind. Very short and very flat, the stage was ideal for Greipel. The team rode a tempo at the head of the peloton to keep the day's breakaway in check, and caught them in the stage's final few kilometers. Getting an effective leadout from Sieberg and Raboň, Greipel at last took a Giro stage win.
  In stage 19, which went over the Passo del Mortirolo, Pinotti returned to the top ten overall by finishing tenth on the day. Pinotti very nearly won the time trial whi
caption: André Greipel had the most wins of any cyclist in the 2010 season, and a stage in the Giro d'Italia was one of them.
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