Maps of Il Giro and Le Tour

It's too wet to go out for a run or ride after work today, so I'm inside comparing the cartographic qualities of the official maps of the 88th Giro d'Italia and the 92nd Tour de France.

In 2002, the year in which I went to France to see the Tour, the official map changed to an apparently permanent yellow color. Maillot jaune, fine, but I can't stand big blobs of yellow in my browser window. This year's Tour de France has botched the terrain as well, and is stingy about the size of the map.

Wisely choosing not to go with pink, the Giro d'Italia map has natural color hypsometric terrain within Italy and a greyscale shaded relief (re-used from 2004?) without. That and the slightly more grande version (still tiny by my standards) give the 2005 Giro's map the edge at the tape.

Controversy at the Giro today! Check out this series of photos in which Baden Cooke gets chopped down at the finish.