Route looks nice. The only thing is that the first real mountain challenge comes on stage 14 only. I would also prefer one long flat ITT to two ITTs of average length. I don't think TT specialists will get a big advantage after first ITT and they'll lose everything in the hardest mountain stages.
Stage 7 with mountaintop finish of 2,5km @ 6% looks childish. Also penultimate climb of this stage doesn't look hard as well. We sometimes criticize organizers of TDF that they doesn't put lot action the first part of the race, I think it might be case of this year's Giro - I expected something more from first 10 days of Giro... 35km TT is nice, but I wanted real mountains as well... First part of this year's TDF looks a slightly better IMO... However, first group stage has a small uphill finish...
Stage 14 with a few medium mountains, 23km @ 7,1% monster and steep mountaintop finish of almost 10% looks excellent.
Stage 15 looks even better with its five high mountain passes, including hard finish of 13,3km @ 7,9%. It is the real killer because only very select group will arrive together for the final climb.
ITT of Stage 16 with a finish at Corones is the third hard test in a row. I don't think that any comments are necessary about this hard mountain.
Stage 19 is the next real test. The only thing is that the biggest challenge of the day is located quite far from the finish and is followed by a few climbs of average difficulty, including a mountaintop finish of 6,3km @ 6,9%. However, it is not possible to finish at brutal climbs all the time.
The final mountain stage has Gavia and Mortirolo. We all know what are those climbs about. The only thing which might reduce action is that Mortirolo comes some 50km from the finish. They could finish at Aprica as in 2006...
Overall, there are two hard mountaintop finishes, one brutal mountain ITT, a beautiful stage with Gavia and Mortirolo - those four stages should decide Giro, as well as Monte Pora stage, Stage 7 with a small climb in the end, 2 flat ITTs of average length and TTT.
). But he could still ride a good GC result and take a mountain stage.
