It wasn’t as if the presumptive overall favorite had a bad day, but nor did the Dane capitalize on a chance to distance his rivals. The talented Dutchman on Netcompany-Ineos did.
It wasn’t as if Jonas Vingegaard (Visma-Lease a Bike) had a bad day at the Giro d’Italia, but the stage 10 individual time trial that seemed like a great opportunity for the Dane to stamp his authority on the race did not play out that way.
Ahead of the 42 km test from Viareggio to Massa on the Tuscan coast, race leader Afonso Eulálio seemed to have given up hope of staying in pink. Felix Gall of Decathlon-CMA CGM was under no illusions that he would be shipping time in the discipline to his rivals. Vingegaard and Visma seemed calm but confident, unconcerned that the maglia azzurra he is wearing as leader of the mountains classification would cost him much time compared to his team issue skinsuit.
When all was said and done, however, Eulálio remained in pink. Vingegaard was an unspectacular 13th on the stage, not quite two minutes faster than Eulálio and only 1:22 faster than Gall. The big storyline was not Vingegaard taking control of the Giro; it was Thymen Arensman (Netcompany-Ineos) delivering a brilliant runner-up ride behind stage-winning teammate Filippo Ganna to surge into third overall.
In the aftermath of the stage, Vingegaard was quick to point out that this sort of challenge isn’t really his thing.
He was smiling as he remarked that the TT was a “terrible” experience and then proceeded to say, “It’s not my specialty to do a flat time trial like this. I’ve never been super good at it and to be honest I think I came through pretty well today.”
Perhaps it’s no surprise that the typically even-keeled Vingegaard kept his cool after the stage, but the fact is that he actually has been “super good” at flat time trials before – and yet he wasn’t on Tuesday.
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