Jonas Vingegaard took the Giro d’Italia general classification by the scruff of the neck on Saturday, with a decisive win on stage 14.
On one of the toughest stages of the 21 of this year’s event, the Visma-Lease a Bike rider attacked a group of favourites with 4.8km of the stage to go, riding to the final alone and taking the overall lead with seven stages to go.
Vingegaard’s attack instantly distanced Felix Gall (Decathlon CMA CGM), though, even with Davide Piganzzoli (Visma-Lease a Bike) initially on his wheel. The Austrian managed his effort, dropping the Italian and finishing in second place, 49 seconds down.
Jai Hindley (Red Bull-Bora-hansgrohe) was third a further nine seconds behind.
Always touted as a decisive stage, it saw Afonso Eulálio (Bahrain Victorious) cede the race leader’s maglia rosa, after the Portuguese rider took it on stage five. Eulálio spent much of the final climb close to the back of the favourites’ group and was dropped with 9km remaining, he battled on though, eventually finishing 115th, though he remains second overall. He’s now 2.26 behind Vingegaard, with Gall third, a further 245 seconds back.
The day also saw Thymen Arensman (Netcompany-Ineos) slip one spot down the GC to fourth place, just ahead of Jai Hindley (Red Bull-Bora-hansgrohe).
Vingegaard’s victory came on the back of a dominant performance from his Visma-Lease a Bike team. They were dominant throughout the stage, which began with a first category climb and ascended more than 4,000m over the 133km. They monitored the breakaway from the neutral zone until the last of a huge bunch of escapees was finally brought to heel just over 5km from the line.
“I think this one is the one I will remember the most today,” Vingegaard said after the stage. “We made a plan from the start with the team and we wanted to control the race and that’s what my team mates did. They did an incredible job all day, it was really impressive how they rode, I’m so proud of my team mates and I’m so proud that I can pay them back, it’s a super nice win.
“It’s always a bit of improvisation, we said when it got steep in the end we wanted to try, then Piganzoli, I almost didn’t have to attack today, he rode everyone out of my wheel almost, so that was really impressive,” he said of the winning attack.
More to follow…
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