"If you're positioned just behind..." - Visma's Cian Uijtdebroeks learning from his mistakes the hard way

Team Visma | Lease a Bike have managed to get a stage win at Tirreno-Adriatico with a surprising Olav Kooij on a day filled with attacks and echelons, however when it comes to the overall classification by now, expectations are low. Simon Yates' form is non-optimal, and Cian Uijtdebroeks has free reign to do his race. However the Belgian emerged from stage 5 lamenting a clear mistake on the final climb, which he is aware of.

“Our guys could have made things much easier for themselves because we knew it was a technical descent. We also knew the group would split there, and if you're positioned just behind..." DS Marteen Wynants said in a press release issued by the team. "Well, at least it came back together, so the damage was avoided. But these are key learning moments if you want to be a GC rider. Then you have to be at the front.”

Uijtdebroeks wasn't afraid to admit his mistake: "I know exactly what happened—I was simply too far back on the climb, and a gap opened up. I had already made a move to the front earlier, but I should have done that a little later. Instead, I drifted back, and that’s when the split happened right in front of me. I had to close it, and I managed to do about 50% of it myself because I still had the power. I wasn’t completely at my limit, though on one of the last steep sections, I even threw away my bottle to save a bit of weight."

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The stage wasn't attacked too harshly, with Tom Pidcock being the one to launch a move in the final meters of the last ascent of the day, but to no avail. However that acceleration and the technical descent caused splits in the peloton, and the Visma riders were not in the front group where according to Uijtdebroeks, they had the legs to be present at:

“That remains a work in progress, for sure. These kinds of climbs, with flat-steep-flat-steep sections, don’t suit me well because they require a lot of punch. I really have to time my move correctly to get to the front, but today my timing was off," he adds. "Saturday’s climb suits me much better.”

Wynants hopes that at least this stage stays in mind for the young climber and that “this is a learning moment for Cian. Friday’s uphill finish will be much easier for him—he can go all out until the line. These are the types of situations we put time and effort into, but he’s not the most explosive rider in the bunch, which makes it harder for him. We knew Ayuso, Pidcock, or even Van der Poel would attack on that final steep kicker, and that’s when everything stretches out.”

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