"Everything to play for" into the mountains, as Jai Hindley revives high GC ambitions

Jai Hindley has finished Tirreno-Adriatico in fifth place, showing signs of returning to the level that has seen him breakthrough in 2020. Back at the Giro d'Italia this month, the Australian is looking to replicate his climbing prowess, and is showing good signs.

"The team’s doing a good job, we’ve got lots of good morale and everything to play for. In the TT I was personally pretty happy with the ride. It could have gone a bit better, could have been a bit worse. But either way it’s not the end of the world," Hindley told Cyclingnews. Despite his long track record as a mediocre time-trialist, he finished 32nd in the individual time-trial in Budapest, only 34 seconds behind Simon Yates. 

"Before that on the uphill finish [on Friday] I lost a bit of time but it’s not anything to be too stressed about, either. Those punchy finishes are probably not my strongest ones, so I’m pretty happy I finished up there with the main GC guys," he added. 

Part of the GC-eyeing trio of BORA - hansgrohe, together with Wilco Kelderman and Emanuel Buchmann, Hindley will now enter terrain that's favourable to him and the signs he's giving so far this year are good. "Obviously Simon Yates is doing very well but among the GC riders, the level is very high this year," he concluded when asked about who was the rider to keep under eye.