Many riders saved their legs in yesterday's time trial to be ready for today's 9th stage from Sansepolcro to Firenze. The 170km route takes the riders deep into the Apennines and over four categorized climbs on a day that has breakaway written all over it and many riders have marked this one out as one of the perfect opportunities to go for a stage win. Briefly touching the course of this year's world championships the stage has been designed as some kind of a dress rehearsal for September's big event and while the one-day specialists test out future challenges, the GC riders have to be careful as the terrain could invite to a surprise attack. Starting at 14.15 you can follow all the action on CyclingQuotes.com/live.

The 9th stage of this year's Giro is a highly anticipated one but even though it contains plenty of climbing it is not for its potential to shake up the GC. With the 2013 world championships being held in Firenze in September it was always an obvious choice for organizers RCS to let the Giro do a lap on the circuit of that big event. However, economic problems and bad weather have delayed the work on the roads and the stage has had to be modified and will now only briefly touch the road race course. One consequence is that the key Fiesole climb on the worlds course will be climbed from another direction before the riders head down to Firenze.

However, the stage remains a hard one and after two smaller uncategorized hills in the first part of the race, the category 2 Passo della Consuma (16,9km, 3,9%, max. 10%) and the category 1 Vallombrosa (8,8km, 6,4%, max. 12%) climbs await midway through the stage as the riders traverse the Italian mainland. A longer descent and a short, flat stretch lead to the final part of the stage which starts with 29,7km remaining when the riders hit the bottom of the category 3 Vetta le Croci ascent (7,6km, 5,3%, max. 12%). Then it is a short descent before the riders will climb the category 4 Fiesole climb (3,0km, 5,7%, max. 11%) whose top is located on the outskirts of Firenze with 10,7km remaining.  From then on it is mostly downhill before the final 1,78km to the finish line in Piazzale Michelangelo have an average gradient of 3,0%.

While some GC riders lick their wounds and others celebrate their success after yesterday's time trial, the race's main characters will probably pass this one over in their fight for overall glory. Despite the hilly nature of the course the most difficult climbs are too far away from the finish to make any lasting difference, and the final Fiesole ascent is not hard enough to create any real selection. Should any ground be gained on the uphill or downhill section, it will be difficult to keep the chasers at bay in the flat run-in to Firenze and so the GC riders will probably choose a careful but defensive strategy for the day's race.

That will certainly not be the case for the race's many opportunists who have marked this one out as one of the most obvious possibilities for a successful breakaway to fight it out for the win. Hence, we can expect a frantic start to the stage with attacks going thick and fast in the opening part. Almost all teams have participation in the say's escape on their agenda and so it will probably take quite some time before the elastic snaps and the riders not in the move accept their fate and postpone their stage win ambitions to another day.

From then on it will probably be a hard fight between the escapees for the win but it will certainly not be an easy task to bring home the win. The hilly nature of the course means that the winner needs to have his climbing legs turned on and despite the unpredictable nature of the stage it is certainly not possible for everyone to come out victorious on a course like this.

The first part of the stage is dead-flat and this makes it much more difficult to predict the composition of the breakaway. When the race starts with a climb, the strongest riders simply ride away but on flat roads luck becomes a key factor. However, it is not unlikely that the breakaway will not get away before they hit the lower slopes of the day's first climb and if this is the case, we can expect to see some of the strong climbers on the move.

It is not impossible that a team will try to bring it back together if it has missed the move but as there are more breakaway opportunities coming up it is highly unlikely. Furthermore, it is doubtful whether any team has the strength to control a strong escape in this hilly terrain. Should we see any team try to bring it all back together, it will in all likelihood be either Vini Fantini, Androni or Bardiani as the three Italian wild card teams all have uphill strength to chase and likely winner candidates in a sprint (Vini Fantini with Di Luca and Santambrogio, Androni with Felline and Bardiani with Battaglin).

Mountains leader Giovanni Visconti (Movistar) had without any doubt pointed this one out as one to try to fulfill his stage win ambitions. The former Italian champion has put a bad season start behind him and is now in great shape. However, he crashed in stage 6 and while he does not appear to be too bothered by his injuries, he could lack the extra few percentages in a hard stage like this one. Furthermore, his lead in the mountains competition makes it highly unlikely that the Bardiani team will allow him to get anywhere if Stefano Pirazzi has missed the move.

Pirazzi is another obvious contender for today's stage win. Having lost plenty of time in yesterday's time trial he should now enjoy more freedom and with four categorized climbs - one of them even a category 1 ascent - his motivation to go on the attack will be huge. He is one of the few with the strength to simply ride off the front on the day's first ascent but the Movistar will probably not allow him to go up the road if Visconti is not part of the move.

Another good bet for the stage win is Miguel Angel Rubiano. The Colombian won stage 6 in similar terrain last year, is a formidable climber and fast on the line. He had hoped to be in the mix in stage 7 to Pescara and deliberately lost some time on the flat stage to Marina di Savoia to be allowed more freedom. He missed the move on Friday and he will be eager to take his revenge today.

Enrico Battaglin could take the stage win in two different ways. He could either join the day's breakaway or he could win a sprint, should it all come back together. He came very close to doubling his tally on Friday when he won the sprint behind Adam Hansen and he has proved again and again that he has the strength to follow the best on the medium-length climbs. After yesterday's time trial he is now almost 9 minutes behind Nibali and should enjoy the freedom to go on the attack. If he gets into the move, he will be a danger man. He is almost impossible to drop and very few have a chance to beat him in a sprint on the slight rise up towards the finish line.

The number of potential attackers is huge but Michal Golas also deserves a mention. The Pole is riding incredibly strong at the moment and as his Omega Pharma-Quick Step team has lost all GC opportunities, their only possibility in the hilly stages is to go on the attack. So far Golas has been able to follow the best on the climbs each day and there is little doubt that he is eager to exploit his great run of form. Furthermore, he is fast in a sprint and will be hard to beat in a final dash to the line.

The list of possible attackers go on but Peter Stetina, Ben Gastauer, Hubert Dupont, Sylvain Georges, Jackson Rodriguez, Emanuele Sella, Francesco Bongiorno, Stefano Locatelli, Edoardo Zardini, Juan Manuel Garate, Steve Morabito, Cayetano Sarmiento, Cristiano Salerno, Robinson Chalapud, Jarlinson Pantano, Egoi Martinez, Jorge Azanza, Francis Mourey, Petr Ignatenko, Angel Vicioso, Kritijan Durasek, Jose Serpa, Simone Stortoni, Adam Hansen, Eros Capecchi, Juan Jose Cobo, Jose Herrada, Serge Pauwels, Gianluca Brambilla, Tiago Machado, Thomas Damuseau, Evgeni Petrov, Rory Sutherland, Marco Marcato, Alessandro Proni, Matteo Rabottini and Fabio Taborre are some of the names who have the freedom to get clear and the uphill strength to finish it off in a grand manner.

As said it is unlikely to see the GC riders attack each other. Nibali is in a comfortable position and while it could be tempting to test out Wiggins on the descents in the final part of the race, he will probably save his energy for later. The ones who really need to take back time as soon as possible are Ryder Hesjedal and Samuel Sanchez. The latter has so far chosen a defensive strategy and this is unlikely to change tomorrow. However, Hesjedal has showed his offensive approach on numerous occasions and we could see the defending champion test out his rivals behind the day's breakaway. Furthermore, we could see some moves from some of the riders who are just below the biggest favourites and who needs to take back time to keep their top 10 ambitions alive. Robert Kiserlovski, Arnold Jeannesson, Giampaolo Caruso, Carlos Betancur and Yury Trofimov are all potential late attackers.

CyclingQuotes' stage winner picks: Enrico Battaglin, Miguel Angel Rubiano, Stefano Pirazzi

Outsiders: Giovanni Visconti, Michal Golas, Danilo Di Luca