28/05/2023

Opinion: The INEOS 'little train' and a Giro d'Italia to forget

Apart from the last 15 minutes of the Monte Lussari time trial, with Primoz Roglic's chain coming off and the accumulated sweat of an exhausted Geraint Thomas who finally couldn't keep the pink, it wasn't a Giro d'Italia to remember.

We were promised to be very happy with the bestial participation and with the theoretically great route that proved to be wrong considering what cycling is in 2023. Everything started to fall apart with the abandonment of the big favorite, Remco Evenepoel, when he was in pink. From then on it was all downhill.

Michel Wuyts - "I am convinced that Remco had won this Giro d'Italia. I don't say 'could have won', but 'had won'"

The main protagonists of this Giro d'Italia 2023 were the escapees. They have not been (for different reasons) Remco, Primoz, G and Joao Almeida. It was Derek Gee, Ben Healy, Nico Denz, Thibaut Pinot and company.

It has been a Giro that we have spent waiting for the next day for something to happen and the next day never came. The organization's ideas ended up going wrong:

1. I put 3 chrono's to attract a star like Remco Evenepoel and after 10 days he leaves for Covid.

2. I put a beastly mountain in the last week, which causes 2 first weeks with nothing and a last one with tremendous marking and almost no attacks.

3. I put the hardest time trial in history in the penultimate stage, which causes everyone to be afraid of it, think that everything will be played there (as it ended up happening) and do nothing until then.

"Was that the reason G was sweating so much?" - Philippe Gilbert questions Thomas's use of Giro d'Italia skinsuit in decisive stage 20 time-trial

As we say, it has been a Giro d'Italia to forget. Special criticism to Jumbo-Visma and INEOS Grenadiers, the two richest teams of the peloton, which have not proposed absolutely nothing.

Roglic deserved to win in the end because he was stronger on Monte Lussari, where they decided to gamble everything. It's that simple. No more. There was nothing up to that point. Neither Jumbo tried to toughen the race so that at least Roglic could gain seconds with stage bonuses nor INEOS did the same or used Arensman or De Plus as plan B to wear Roglic down and get him more burned at the end.

INEOS Grenadiers brought out its famous 'train', which in this case was more like a little train, as it did not hurt its rivals and its rider lost the race at the end. Always playing the same old game ends up causing defeats...