The 2012 Giro d'Italia began on 5 May, and stage 11 occurred on 16 May. The 2012 edition began with an individual time trial stage – where each member of the starting peloton of 198 riders competed against the clock – in Herning, Denmark with two more stages held in the country before an early rest day. The riders then travelled by air to Italy, with the race resuming in Verona and a team time trial, an event where each member of a team started together racing against the clock.
Taylor Phinney held the lead of the race throughout its opening Danish leg; having won the race-commencing individual time trial, Phinney defended it on the following two stages, despite crashing in the closing stages of the third stage after being involved in a multi-rider incident. Phinney crossed the line in an ambulance, receiving medical attention before making his way onto the rostrum. The incident itself was started by Roberto Ferrari clipping Mark Cavendish – the winner of the second stage – causing Cavendish to fall and the rest of the field to stack up behind. Race organisers saw fit to demote Ferrari on the stage results, penalise him on both time – 30 seconds penalty on the general classification – and a 25-point deduction, while he was fined also. Ferrari was remorseful at the time of the crash, but later apologised to Cavendish and other riders involved.
Upon the race's return to Italy, won the fourth stage, the team time trial in Verona. Alex Rasmussen had been placed third after the Danish leg, but he was dropped during the stage and thus it was Ramūnas Navardauskas who picked up the maglia rosa from Phinney, becoming the first rider from Lithuania to wear the leader's jersey at the Giro. Navardauskas held on to the jersey for another day, before Adriano Malori assumed the lead of the race at the end of stage six. Malori had been a part of the breakaway on that stage, before Miguel Ángel Rubiano soloed to victory on the day. The jersey changed hands again the following day, as Malori cracked during the seventh stage, with Ryder Hesjedal coming through to become the first Canadian to wear the pink jersey. He held the jersey for three days, before handing it over to Joaquim Rodríguez, who took the jersey with a win on the tenth stage, a steep finish into Assisi. Rodríguez held on to the jersey the next day, topping the overall standings with the more mountainous second half of the Giro still to race.
Stage 1
5 May 2012 — Herning (Denmark), , individual time trial (ITT)
The race commenced with a short individual time trial stage, much like it had done on the Giro's previous start in a foreign country – the start in Herning was the tenth time that the race had started outside of Italy, and the furthest north geographically – when the race began with an individual time trial of held in Amsterdam, Netherlands in 2010. The stage in Herning itself, in length, was relatively flat, dropping only in altitude from the start, to the end. Despite this, it was considered technical due to the nature of the parcours, with several tight ninety-degree turns and cobblestones on several sections of the course before the finish at H. P. Hansensvej. Jackson Rodríguez () was the first rider to depart the start house in Herning, recording a time of 11' 58" for the course, a time that was eventually only good enough for the bottom ten places overall.
Indeed, Rodríguez's lead was short-lived as Marco Bandiera (), 's Jonas Aaen Jørgensen and rider Bernhard Eisel all assumed the top spot as they reached the finish, with Robert Hunter of recording the first time under eleven minutes, as he set a time of 10' 54". Hunter's time held to the next group of riders and it was his team-mate Ramūnas Navardauskas that took the lead; Navardauskas recorded a time some six seconds faster, and was good enough to hold off the rest of the field for over two hours. Navardauskas' time was given a few close calls; 's Jesse Sergent went quicker at the start of the stage – four seconds ahead of Navardauskas to the mid-stage intermediate point – but ultimately faded to two seconds outside of the Lithuanian rider's time. A while later, Brett Lancaster went even closer to the time of Navardauskas for the newly renamed team; he was quicker to the intermediate point than what Sergent had been, but fell outside the time by just one second at the stage finish, having encountered his minute-man Andrey Zeits () in the closing stages.