"Jumbo-Visma might be starting to think, ‘Should we have our cake and eat it?'" - Daniel Lloyd on the chances of Jumbo-Visma completing Vuelta podium in Madrid

Just five stages remain at the 2023 Vuelta a Espana as the race resumes after the second rest day. Currently, Jumbo-Visma hold the entirety of the podium through Sepp Kuss, Primoz Roglic and Jonas Vingegaard. Can they hold on for a historic success?

“I think as we edge closer to Madrid, we’ve only got five stages left, two of which are sprints," says ex-pro Daniel Lloyd on Eurosport's The Breakaway as part of the channel's coverage of the final Grand Tour of the year. "Jumbo-Visma might be starting to think, ‘Should we have our cake and eat it? It would be nice to finish with all three of us on the podium’.”

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As things stand, prior to the start of stage 16, Juan Ayuso, Enric Mas and Mikel Landa are the riders closest to the Jumbo-Visma trifecta. "They want to get on that third step or second step of the podium. Ideally, win it but that’s looking like a forlorn hope for most of them at the moment," says Lloyd. "They haven’t given up hope now but the further we get into this the more beaten they’re going to feel.”

Could a Jumbo-Visma civil war give the chasers a boost though? Lloyd thinks not. “I mean first and foremost their aim is to win this race. It has been probably for the whole year. The main goal is Tour de France, before that came the Giro which they’d already won with Primoz Roglic, after that sent a really strong squad to this race, the Vuelta a Espana," he explains. 

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“They couldn’t have imagined it would play out quite as well as it has for them. No sickness, I think Roglic had a small crash but nothing that really affected him, Sepp Kuss being ‘allowed up the road’ and taking the red jersey with that, showing no signs of weakness and relinquishing it even to his own team-mates," Lloyd concludes. “The other point is that they’ve not lost a single rider. They’ve still got eight in this race, so whilst they’ve got three riders to protect, they’ve got five very, very strong riders to do the protecting."

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