"It will be 50-50" - Wout van Aert unsure that stage 14 will end in a bunch sprint

Team Visma | Lease a Bike are in a position of relative comfort now that both Wout van Aert and Olav Kooij have won stages at this Giro d'Italia, and today on stage 14 into Nova Gorica, both are viable options to fight once again - however, that will fully depend on the circumstances of the race.

"We'll have to wait and see how this stage will end. The climb in the final is not long, but we'll do it twice and there are also quite a few obstacles in the local lap. That will give us a lined-up peloton, so it will be 50-50," van Aert said in an interview with Sporza.

The ascent to Savrer, 700 meters at 8%, will cause pain in the legs of many in the final circuit and the final ascent ends with only 8 kilometers to go on the stage. This may not lead to many getting dropped, but it will hurt the pure sprinters and above all make it difficult to recover in the final kilometers if a bunch sprint comes to be.

Van Aert is even more keen on highlighting the importance of the climb: "You don't have to be dropped to be eliminated from the stage win. If you're not in the top 50 on the technical circuits, it will be difficult to get to the front and compete for the win".

The Belgian believes positioning will be very key when it comes to the fight for the stage win, from far away, and we can quickly predict that the GC teams will make the fight for positioning extra hard for anyone else, and make it an even tougher finale.

Visma will be looking out for Simon Yates, whilst van Aert and Kooij will simultaneously have freedom to go for their own results. However if Olav Kooij does survive the climb in good position, we could see a repeat of stage 12's finale. "It's nice that we have two cards to play. The race will tell. If Olav stays with us, he's the fastest and the best chance for us to win".