"He really wasn't the 'team kid' Eulálio anymore" - Turning point in Giro leader Afonso Eulálio's career highlighted

Former Portugal national coach José Poeira believes that the 2025 World Championship marked a decisive shift in Afonso Eulálio’s career. Poeira closely followed the Portuguese rider’s development and considers that the current Giro d’Italia leader has stopped being just a support rider within teams to take on a different status in the international peloton.

Eulálio’s debut for the national team came at the under-23 level, but there were early signs of his potential. At the Course de la Paix, one of the most important races in the category, he finished third on the queen mountain stage, something that caught José Poeira’s attention. “It was a sign that he really had the right qualities,” he recalled.

Even so, for the Portuguese coach, the real step up came at the 2025 World Championships in Rwanda. In a particularly demanding race, Eulálio finished ninth, securing one of Portugal’s best-ever results in the elite road race.

More than the result, it was the way he raced that impressed Poeira—trying to respond directly to Tadej Pogacar and then hanging on with the other contenders in one of the Worlds with the most elevation gain ever.

“He rode a smart race, well-positioned, always in the right place, reading the race, not clashing with the main [contenders] and then he’d settle into a good group that would carry him back up there again. [...] That’s when I saw and understood that he really was no longer Eulálio the team’s kid, there to help his teammates—he was a bit more than that. And the team saw it too,” he explained.

The former selector believes that performance also changed Bahrain - Victorious’ perception of the Portuguese rider. The fact that he was the only member of the team to finish the race likely strengthened internal confidence in his abilities.

“He came from the back to the front, always progressing, and constantly gaining experience, because he’s intelligent, we’ve already seen he knows how to read things, and he’s starting to have ambition, starting to believe in himself. And that makes the team, in a situation like that, [think] let’s help him, because spending however many days in the leader’s jersey is already very good for him, and for the team as well,” he said, in statements to Lusa news agency.

Poeira even admits that Eulálio can finish this Giro in the top 10 overall, especially after the withdrawals of some contenders—Adam Yates and Santiago Buitrago during the race; João Almeida, Richard Carapaz, and Mikel Landa even before it started—echoing the view of some experts, led by Alberto Contador, who considers him a podium contender.

Even so, he reminds us that the greatest difficulty is always reserved for the final phase of Grand Tours. “It gets to a point where the levels there are very high—renowned riders with experience—and things have to be managed very carefully. What he’s doing is managing his abilities, his strength, because we’re talking about a three-week race. And that’s another point we want to see—how he handles it. The problem for most riders is the third week,” he stressed.

In the former national coach’s analysis, the big question now is how the Portuguese rider’s body will respond to the accumulated fatigue. After abandoning the 2025 Giro in the antepenultimate stage, this is only his second experience in a three-week race.

“From last year to this year, maybe he’s improved a lot in that three-week aspect. He might even be in good shape. Now, there’s extra wear from being the leader, the pressure—though I think he handles pressure well. For him it’s one day at a time, and the days just go by. But the fact that he’s in the leader’s jersey means he has to go to the podium, he has to pass control... While the others finish and go to the hotel to rest, he has another hour or more of wear with various things,” he warned.

Despite that, Poeira believes the Portuguese rider has handled the media and competitive impact of this new reality well. “When he went to a foreign team, [...] a big team, there’s an adaptation period, and he’s adapting very well—excellent, in fact—and he’s figured out how to race, how things have to be done. Last year, I saw that he was much more mature, much calmer, he wasn’t stressed about anything,” he compared, recalling Eulálio’s Worlds debut.

For José Poeira, the evolution of the Bahrain - Victorious rider has been evident in recent months, and the Portuguese has now entered a new phase of his career. “He’s improved a lot from one year to the next,” he summed up, admitting there is still room to grow.

Even if he loses the pink jersey to Jonas Vingegaard, he believes Eulálio can remain among the best in the general classification. “He’ll lose time, but if he loses the jersey and Vingegaard takes the lead, and he stays close... he can hold on to a good spot and, with the help of others’ work, he can remain in or around the top 10. Now, the third week is decisive. I don’t think it’s impossible. Given what he’s already done, with all these days in the leader’s jersey, if he then finishes in the top 10, he’ll have had a great Giro d’Italia,” he concluded.