Tour de France champion Alberto Contador won the Giro d'Italia on Sunday, the first non-Italian to ride to victory in the three-week race since 1996. “This was a tough Giro and there were many riders who could have won, making it worth as much as the Tour or even more,” Contador said. Contador edged Italy's Riccardo Ricco by 1 minute, 57 seconds over the 3,424-kilometer course. The Spaniard, who rides for Astana, entered Sunday's final stage with a four-second lead and managed the best overall time without winning a stage. Marzio Bruseghin was third, 2:54 behind Contador. Marco Pinotti, who rides for High Road, won the final stage – a 28.5-kilometer time trial from Cesano Maderno to Milan – in 32:45. Pinotti's teammate Tony Martin was second, 7 seconds back. Contador joins Miguel Indurain, who won in 1992 and 1993, as the only Spaniards to win the Giro. Russia's Pavel Tonkov won in 1996. Though the Giro has had trouble in recent years attracting the top non-Italian riders, this year the race started with the defending champion from last year's three most important multi-day races. In addition to Contador, last year's Giro winner Danilo Di Luca and Denis Menchov, who won the 2007 Spanish Vuelta, took part. Giro officials invited Contador's Astana team only about a week before the start and it was not clear what condition the Spaniard was in. He said several times that he was on vacation at a Spanish beach when his team manager said he could ride in the Giro. Contador will not have the chance to defend his Tour de France title because Astana has been excluded from the race this year due to a team doping scandal before his arrival. “I don't think they will change their mind and invite the team,” Contador said. Ricco won two stages and seemed on the verge of grabbing the leader's pink jersey several times, but never managed. The closest he got was Friday when he left Contador behind on the final climb of a mountain stage, closing the gap to four seconds. In the last mountain stage on Saturday, Ricco made several attempts to leave Contador behind on the climbs, but the Spaniard kept close.
