Giro leader Eulálio low on hope - ‘The only rider who can beat Vingegaard is Pogacar’

After a calmer day into Verbania, where the breakaway was allowed to contest the stage win and the general classification riders reached the finish together, Eulálio had at least managed to protect the pink jersey for another day. Still, he stopped short of calling it a day of recovery.

“I think the recovery day will come in two days,” Eulálio said afterwards to CyclingPro.net. “Today was a calmer day, but it was also a long day. In the end, we kept the pink jersey, and that is the most important thing.”

The race leader is also having to adapt to a sharp change in conditions. Earlier in the Giro, when he first moved into pink, the peloton had been racing through rain, cold and hail. Now the race has been hit by much warmer weather, with temperatures rising towards 30 degrees.

“When I took the pink jersey, it rained all day and there was a lot of hail,” he said. “It was a very hard day for the body. Now we are racing in 30 degrees, and of course that changes a lot for our bodies."

If Friday allowed the GC riders to keep the race under control, Saturday offers very little chance of doing the same. Stage 14 may be only around 130 kilometres long, but the climbing starts early and never really lets the race breathe. By the time the road rises towards Pila, there will already be plenty of damage in the legs.

“It is a super hard day,” Eulálio said. “We start with a super long climb and we finish with a super long climb. We will see. I hope I have good legs tomorrow, and I just keep fighting.”

Asked whether he felt ready for the challenge, the Maglia Rosa did not try to sell certainty.

“I’ll tell you tomorrow.”

The biggest threat, inevitably, is Jonas Vingegaard. The Dane has already shown his superiority on the uphill finishes in this Giro, taking significant time on Blockhaus before again distancing Eulálio on Corno alle Scale. 

Pila offers Vingegaard another chance to tighten his grip on the race. At just 33 seconds behind Eulálio, the Dane appears to have the perfect stage to prise the Maglia Rosa from the Portuguese rider’s shoulders.

Eulálio, for his part, made few illusions about how difficult the jersey will be to defend if Vingegaard decides to turn the screw.

“Jonas doesn’t need to make a big attack,” he said. “Jonas is Jonas. I think the only rider who can beat him is Pogačar, and Pogačar is not here.”

The plan, then, is not complicated. Stay with Vingegaard for as long as possible, and if the elastic snaps, make sure he is still in the fight behind him.

“We just have to follow him,” he said. “When he goes fast, we get dropped, and then we fight behind him. That’s it.”