How a calculated risk won Visma the Giro: "There was a chance Carapaz would gamble and Del Toro wouldn't know what to do"

The stage 20 of 2025 Giro d'Italia, which featured the returning giant Colle delle Finestre, will be remembered for many reasons. The tactical chess between Isaac del Toro and Richard Carapaz, the brilliant Wout Van Aert, and the fairy tale of Simon Yates are just a few of the many points that will be debated for many years to follow.

Ultimately, Visma | Lease a Bike were the biggest winners of the day with a pixel-perfectly executed strategy to turn the race upside down. However the overall victory of Yates did not come of it's own accord. Through his consistency in previouis nineteen stages, Yates survived all the chaos and havoc that got the best of pre-race favourites Primoz Roglic and Juan Ayuso, but still sat only third overall, more than a minute behind pink jersey Isaac del Toro.

"Until the seventeenth stage, Simon had been in second place behind leader Del Toro. Until then, there was less focus on Simon, but we realized there was a possibility Del Toro would focus more on Carapaz after Simon lost his second place," revealed Visma's DS Marc Reed how their daring maglia rosa coup come to life in an interview for Wieler Revue.

"We also thought there was a chance Carapaz would gamble on the Finestre and Del Toro wouldn't know exactly what to do. We mainly wanted to create a situation where that could happen. One way to do that was to get riders into the early breakaway, so Simon could still have someone with him in the 25 kilometers or so after the summit of the Finestre."

That prediction turned out to be 100% accurate, as the Ecuadorian tested his younger Mexican rival, but could not get a decisive advantage and so the two sat up. Suddenly, Yates was the one to make his move, and one of his accelerations ended up without a reply as Carapaz and Del Toro were too locked into their duel.

The second half of Visma's plan also went to a point as they managed to get a satellite rider up the road. And not just any name, but Wout Van Aert, a man that contributed significantly to Tadej Pogacar's defeat at the 2022 Tour de France. "Having Wout in the breakaway was a bonus," Reef confirms.

And the peloton would eventually turn out to simply not be strong enough to control the escaped group. "UAE was riding behind with only Baroncini. He had to control a group of thirty riders, which kept the gap growing. When EF Education-EasyPost decided to help, Baroncini dropped out again. When, at one point, a number of EF riders overpaced on a descent, they had to stop again. The gap between the leaders kept growing."

All that played into the hands of Visma who now only needed for Yates to get rid of his rivals. "We knew: if Wout could start the Finestre with an eight-minute lead, there's a good chance he'd survive all the way to the summit. Several tactical factors made this denouement possible, but it all starts with having faith that it's possible to turn around."

And so, Yates finally settled unfinished business with Giro d'Italia which lasted since 2018. "It was almost meant to be, and that's what makes cycling so beautiful. This Giro d'Italia finale is, for me, the story of the year. It had the chance to put that day right in 2018, and it did so in a way that will forever capture the imagination."