The 1997 Giro d'Italia was the 80th edition of the Giro. It began on 17 May with a mass-start stage that began and ended in Venice. The race came to a close on 8 June with a mass-start stage that ended in the Italian city of Milan. Eighteen teams entered the race that was won by the Italian Ivan Gotti of the team. Second and third were the Russian rider Pavel Tonkov and Italian Giuseppe Guerini. In the race's other classifications, rider Chepe González won the mountains classification, Mario Cipollini of the Saeco team won the points classification, and rider Dimitri Konyshev won the intergiro classification. Kelme – Costa Blanca finished as the winners of the Trofeo Fast Team classification, ranking each of the eighteen teams contesting the race by lowest cumulative time. The other team classification, the Trofeo Super Team classification, where the teams' riders are awarded points for placing within the top twenty in each stage and the points are then totaled for each team was won by Saeco. Teams Eighteen teams were invited by the race organizers to participate in the 1997 edition of the Giro d'Italia. Each team sent a squad of ten riders, which meant that the race started with a peloton of 180 cyclists. From the riders that began the race, 110 made it to the finish in Milan. The eighteen teams that took part in the race were: Route and stages The route for the 1997 Giro d'Italia was unveiled by race director Carmine Castellano on 9 November 1996 in Milan. It contained two time trial events, all of which were individual. There were ten stages containing high mountains, of which three had summit finishes: stage 5, to Monte Terminillo; stage 14, to Breuil-Cervinia; and stage 20, to Passo del Tonale. The organizers chose to include one rest day. When compared to the previous year's race, the race was shorter, contained the same amount of rest days and stages, as well as one more individual time trial. Classification leadership Four different jerseys were worn during the 1997 Giro d'Italia. The leader of the general classification – calculated by adding the stage finish times of each rider, and allowing time bonuses for the first three finishers on mass-start stages – wore a pink jersey. This classification is the most important of the race, and its winner is considered as the winner of the Giro.