"We'll try to come up with something" - Under the radar, can Simon Yates win Giro d'Italia for Visma?

Is Simon Yates riding the perfect Giro d'Italia? Whilst Juan Ayuso, Isaac del Toro, Primoz Roglic and Egan Bernal are amongst those in the spotlight every single day in the mountains or hills, under the radar the Team Visma | Lease a Bike rider continues to ride a consistent race and goes into the final week sitting in second position on the overall classification.

"Hopefully no bad luck comes my way, which often does," Yates said after the finish of stage 15, as reported by Cyclingnews. The Briton has thus far avoided the crashes that affected Primoz Roglic, Juan Ayuso and Antonio Tiberi; the splits in the rain and gravel; and has been present in all the climbing challenges thus far without spending or showing too much of himself.

In the time-trials, the Briton has raced very strongly and had some luck with the weather, which sees him go into stage 16 - the first of the three queen stages of the race - ahead of even Ayuso himself in the overall classification, and only behind Isaac del Toro. With UAE prioritizing a conservative strategy and mostly focused on Primoz Roglic over the first two weeks of the race, Yates has not been distanced anywhere except for the gravel stage by the Mexican.

Of course, in order to win this Giro, Yates will still have to hope for a bad day from UAE, which will be even harder due to the fact that they have to direct candidates for victory: "They looked strong and also had a lot of guys there in the final to control things. Of course, that's nothing new. We'll try to come up with something, but who knows?" Yates goes into the final week with a gap of 1:20 minutes back from Del Toro, and six seconds ahead of Ayuso.