DISCUSSION Giro d'Italia Stage 9 | Van Aert is back! Who is the leader at UAE now, Ayuso or Del Toro? Did Primoz Roglic lose the Giro?
CyclingMonday, 19 May 2025 at 09:36
Madness, chaos, drama and carnage. Stage 9 of the Giro d'Italia included all the ingredients that cycling fans love and made us fall in love with this sport. The Mini Strade Bianche did not disappoint and proved that not only the big mountain stages can be decisive for the overall classification.
A crazy day of racing where so many things happened and that saw the main favourite Primoz Roglic losing over a minute with Juan Ayuso and most of other GC contenders. Wout van Aert showed he is back, always a great news for every cycling fan and for cycling in general. Issac del Toro was terrific, stealing the Maglia Rosa and who knows if the leadership of the team as well.
It will be a very busy rest day for everyone tomorrow, before the second time trial of this edition kicks off on Tuesday. It will be time for revenge for riders such as Roglic, who already lost a lot of time today and must switch his mentality to be much more offensive than what he usually is.
Once the stage finished, we asked some of our writers to share their thoughts and main takeaways after this absolute thriller of a stage. Rúben Silva's can be found in his opinion article.
Miguel Marques (CiclismoAtual)
And we went from storm to bonanza in two days. The 7th stage brought crashes and confusion, a difficult day in the Giro, the 8th gave us a good fight, victory for the breakaway and the beautiful story of Ulissi in pink, the 9th was spectacular, what an etapón (as our Spanish friends would say) on the dirt.
We saw an offensive INEOS, a strong Bernal, a super del Toro, a consistent Ayuso and an unlucky Roglic as always, he seems to be something more than unlucky and it seems that the curse of the Tour, that he will never win, is extending to the other grand tours, let's wait!
But back to the positives, I was delighted to see Van Aert return to winning ways, he hung on like a lion to the Mexican's wheel and won with class in Piazza del Campo, a comeback that will put a smile on any cycling enthusiast's face!
The Mexican, del Toro, looked like he couldn't believe what had happened, but believe me, boy, you're the leader of the Tour of Italy! A very positive note also for Ciccone, Carapaz and Tiberi, they're in the fight for victory and what a treat it is to see the race close up.
Ivan Silva (CiclismoAtual)
That has gotta be one of the most spetacular stages i've seen in recent years. Which comes to show you dont need high mountains to put on a show. Give us some unpredictability! Falls, flat tyres, guys ahead getting dropped, guys behind chasing... I was doing Liveblog and I could barely keep up with what was happening on the sterrato sectors.
Kudos for Bernal's efforts, keeps looking better and better by the day. Warning signs for Primoz Roglic who lacked team support, specially from the classics specialists who should have been next to him today. UAE looks strong in numbers and will definitely use the numbers advantage to break down Roglic.
And what a comeback from Van Aert! Man looked like he was done for good and when you least expect he pulls one of the greatest wins of his career! Overall, amazing stage! Giro needs more stages like this!
Carlos Silva (CiclismoAtual)
The Giro d'Italia began at 51 KMS of the Via Santa Caterina with the crash of Primoz Roglic. The Slovenian went down, the race exploded and chaos ensued on the white Italian roads. A bloodthirsty INEOS gave everything for Egan Bernal, who broke his engine. But Brandon Rivera... Chapeau, what a stage.
Del Toro and Wout van Aert went head-to-head at the end, but the Visma man had put the Mexican on the limit and then Del Toro couldn't make up the difference at 16 per cent gradient, despite weighing 12 kilos less than the belgian rider. Wout van Aert raised his arms and smiled again. He deserved it.
Cycling fans thank you. It was a great day of cycling, as expected, and now the general classification is upside down. The UAE has two cards to play, Roglic is two minutes off the lead, with all the other podium contenders in Rome between one and two minutes behind going into the second week of the race. The race is on fire.
Félix Serna (CyclingUpToDate)
The way Wout van Aert has evolved during this first week is absolutely mind-blowing. We all remember how far from his best shape he looked during the first stages, struggling so much in the climbs and being out of contention in the kind of stages in which he would have been the absolute favorite in past seasons. However, his improvement has been exponential in the last 2-3 stages, and today he showed terrific form.
Always well positioned, he managed to get out of trouble, unlike riders such as Primoz Roglic and Tom Pidcock. Luck was on his side this time, with no crashes or inopportune punctures affecting him. He was also able to suffer, especially in the last 15km when Isaac del Toro really pushed hard in hopes of dropping him.
I have to admit that I was almost certain that del Toro was too strong for van Aert and that he was going to arrive solo to Siena, but the Belgian superstar proved me wrong, and I am happy he did. He is not in his best shape yet, but this van Aert is completely different than the one just a few days ago, and I hope he will continue improving and being more and more protagonist. The race needs it, cycling needs it.
Of course I cannot forget about Isaac del Toro, the young Mexican rising star might be becoming a full-fledged star in this Giro. He proved once again he is in top shape and was very very close to winning. He still got the Maglia Rosa as a consolation prize, not a bad prize for sure. He is now leader with 1:13 on his teammate Juan Ayuso, which raises very interesting questions.
Can the hierarchy of UAE change after what happened today? Officially, the team had come to the Giro with a co-leadership, shared by Adam Yates and Juan Ayuso, even if the feeling of most fans was that Ayuso was the actual leader. But now we have del Toro with a comfortable lead on the rest of the contenders. Who would have thought that he would have 2:25 on Roglic after the first week?
Third place, Antonio Tiberi, is 1:30 behind del Toro already, and the rest of the top 10 is between 1:30 and 2:25 behind. And del Toro has proven to be consistent in every terrain: excellent climber, really good time trialist (he was 12th in Tirana last week), very solid in classics and very capable of adapting to most situations.
Can he actually become the leader de facto of the team as long as he shows he is strong enough to follow the GC guys? Would the team order Ayuso to wait for del Toro and help him in the hypothetical case that Roglic has attacked and is going solo? Will Ayuso still be the real leader? We already know that Ayuso is not a rider that loves working as a domestique, as we could see in last year’s Tour de France, will it be different now?
Anyways, what is clear is that UAE has another piece to be played in the GC board and on paper is the biggest winner after the first 9 stages. And Roglic is now forced to attack, something he is not used to at all. The Giro is open and unpredictable, a complete change compared to a few days ago. We should celebrate, habemus Giro.
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Víctor LF (CiclismoAlDía)
The 'mini Strade Bianche' has not disappointed and has left us the best stage of this Giro d'Italia so far. Very smart by UAE allowing Isaac del Toro to be in the lead of the race to have one more asset in the overall and take pressure off Juan Ayuso. Finally we have seen a Wout van Aert at his level.
For his part, Primoz Roglic continues with his terrible bad luck, although he remains fully alive in the fight for the Maglia Rosa, so we can say that he comes out well. Finally, note the strange tactic of Lidl-Trek, who had Mathias Vacek ahead but pulled behind for Giulio Ciccone and distanced Roglic as much as possible.
Juan López (CiclismoAlDía)
Primoz Roglic saves the Giro d'Italia. I think that after everything that has happened in a historic stage, the Slovenian, taking into account that there is another time trial and ALL the high mountains ahead, still has not lost the corsa rosa. Of course, obviously, he will not have it easy against a UAE that as a block is far superior to Red Bull. Incredible what is left in these next 2 weeks.
And you? What are your thoughts about everything that happened today? Leave a comment and join the discussion!
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Roglic crashed(out. of his own fault), had a puncture 40+km from the finish. All the big shots up front and they managed to put 1 minute into him. Chasing basically alone. UAE is pathetic without Pogacar, not a team, just a bunch of people riding in same jerseys. I think even Bernal and Carapaz can beat them. I imagine a podium with no UAE rider on it at the end
I assume Del Toro will be in pink for a while. Maybe even good for Ayuso that the pressure is off him now for a while.
I still think Ayuso is team leader because I do not expect Del Toro to be a serious contender in the high mountainbike.
Fun development 😁 I loved the stage also.
Did Bora get some bad spaghetti? What should be a strong team didn't look like it today.
On what basis are you marketing them as a strong team? Budget, past results, organisation, complementary roles?