"Physically, he pushes bizarre power numbers" - Red Bull wary of Jonas Vingegaard threat as Giro illness hits Pellizzari and Hindley

Red Bull - BORA - hansgrohe’s Giro d’Italia challenge has reached a delicate point just as the race arrives at one of its most important tests. Jai Hindley and Giulio Pellizzari remain inside the top 10 overall, but illness concerns inside the team have added another complication before the Stage 10 individual time trial.

Pellizzari and Gianni Moscon have both been dealing with stomach problems, while Hindley also entered the time trial under concern amid reports of a bug affecting the Red Bull camp. The timing is far from ideal.

Hindley began Stage 10 fourth overall, 4:32 behind race leader Afonso Eulalio, while Pellizzari sat ninth at 5:15 after dropping three places on Stage 9. Both remain inside the top 10, but Jonas Vingegaard’s second summit finish victory of the race has changed the pressure around the GC fight.

Mick van Dijke, however, insists Red Bull have not reached a crisis point. Speaking to In de Leiderstrui, the Dutchman made clear that the team still sees a route forward, even if the next phase of the race will demand a major response against Vingegaard.

Van Dijke has had to take on a heavy workload already in this Giro. The 25-year-old came into the race after a demanding Classics campaign and admitted his own opening days had not been straightforward. “I felt very bad during the first few days, although that was probably also because it was so calm,” he said. “I expected things to start turning around after the Blockhaus stage on day seven, but actually it already started going very well from that rainy day on Stage 5. It is going well uphill too, so I can do my work properly.”

That has become increasingly important for Red Bull. Nico Denz crashed earlier in the race, Moscon has not been at full strength, and the team’s two leaders now face the most exposed kind of stage possible. In a 42km time trial, there is no peloton to hide in and no tactical cover if the legs are missing.

“That is a bit of a fine line,” Van Dijke said of his own workload. “We do have to be careful with what I ask of my body. But with Nico Denz’s crash and Gianni not feeling super, a lot of work is falling on my shoulders.”

The team’s leadership dynamic remains one of the more interesting threads of the race. Hindley brings Grand Tour experience and calm, while Pellizzari has been one of the more aggressive young riders in the GC fight. Van Dijke described the two as very different personalities, but a pairing that has quickly become central to Red Bull’s Giro.

“You can see that clearly,” he said. “Giulio is very outgoing and Jai is a bit more timid. But they are constantly joking with each other and, in the way they behave, they almost seem like two brothers. Jai the older brother, Giulio the younger one. I actually don’t know how else to put it.”

That contrast also shows on the road. Hindley is more measured, Pellizzari more instinctive. On Blockhaus, the Italian paid for that aggression, but Van Dijke did not frame it as a negative.

“He is a very cheerful guy, who is super talented,” Van Dijke said of Pellizzari. “He really hit the wall on the Blockhaus, but I only think it is very nice to see that he can race so freely and that he dared to try. A lot of guys then switch on their Garmin and ride one tempo to the top. Giulio at least tried.”

The difficulty for Red Bull is that Vingegaard has already begun to look like the reference point of this Giro. He has won both summit finishes so far, moved to second overall at 2:24 behind Eulalio, and now reaches the long, flat Stage 10 time trial with the chance to put further pressure on the entire GC field.

Van Dijke did not dress that up. Red Bull’s staff have worked to prepare Hindley and Pellizzari for the test, but the scale of the task is obvious. “The team has of course been very busy getting those two perfectly set up on the bike and preparing them,” he said. “We do not have to be afraid of anyone, but we also have to be realistic that, with Jonas Vingegaard, we are up against a world-class rider. Physically, he pushes bizarre power numbers, but he also has a great body for time trialling.”

That is the problem now facing Red Bull. Hindley and Pellizzari were already trying to defend their place in the top 10 rather than ride from a position of control, and the time trial risked stretching the gap to Vingegaard even further. With illness disrupting the team and the Dane arriving at the second week with momentum firmly on his side, Stage 10 had the potential to become a defining test of Red Bull’s GC ambitions.

Van Dijke still framed the task as one Red Bull must attack rather than survive. “We are going to do everything we can to take time, as the staff have said,” he added. “But that will not be simple. It is not PlayStation.”

For Hindley and Pellizzari, the time trial now carries more than simple seconds. It will show whether Red Bull’s two-leader plan can keep holding under pressure, or whether Vingegaard’s Giro threat is already starting to stretch the race beyond them.