january 2005 saw the death of basso's mother, who died after battling cancer. basso went on to focus on the 2005 giro d'italia, in her memory, as his main aim for that season. by both focusing on winning the giro and the tour, he was going against the trend of only aiming for one big race a season, a tactic most notably employed successfully by lance armstrong. basso wore the pink jersey as leader of the general classification in the giro d'italia until severe stomach problems caused him to lose the lead on stage 13 on the passo delle erbe. he lost another 40 minutes during the 14th stage, a mountain stage which included the stelvio pass, and thus effectively ended his bid for overall honors. no longer dangerous to the other main riders, basso decided to continue in the race with the objective of winning individual stages. he did manage to achieve this goal at stage 17, a mountain stage. he also won the 18th stage, a time trial, ahead of teammate david zabriskie, demonstrating the improvement he had made in this area.