Vingegaard leaves no doubt with dominant summit hat-trick to take pink

Jonas Vingegaard (Visma | Lease a Bike) stamped his authority on the Giro d’Italia as the Dane soloed to victory on stage 14 and seized the maglia rosa from Afonso Eulálio (Bahrain-Victorious). 

Stage 14, featuring over 4,000m of elevation gain, concluded with the third summit finish of the race, and Vingegaard and Visma capitalised on the terrain that suits him best, marking a hat-trick of summit finish wins. 

Vingegaard made his race-winning move with 4.6km remaining, after Davide Piganzoli's (Visma | Lease a Bike) and his teammates' tempo had distanced all but Felix Gall (Decathlon CMA CGM).

Vingegaard sailed away from Gall and the competition as he took a significant step forward in his quest to win the Giro on debut.

Gall battled to finish second, 0:49 behind Vingegaard, while Jai Hindley (Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe) took third, 0:58 behind the Dane. Meanwhile, Eulálio dug deep to try and defend the maglia rosa, but the Portuguese rider had to relent with 8.7km remaining, when he was distanced. 

Vingegaard now leads the Giro by 2:26 over Eulálio and Gall rounds out the podium at 2:50.

For the first time in this Giro, the stage started immediately with a significant climb, the category one Saint-Barthélémy. A group of around 28 riders pushed clear, including Giulio Ciccone (Lidl-Trek), Jhonatan Narváez and David de la Cruz (Pinarello-Q36.5), who was the highest placed in GC. 

Visma | Lease a Bike headed the peloton, which was already shrinking in size as the likes of Jonathan Milan (Lidl-Trek) and Dylan Groenewegen (Unibet Rose Rockets) found themselves distanced early, as well as Christian Scaroni (XDS Astana), with the latter abandoning a short while after. 

Meanwhile, Michael Storer (Tudor) suffered a puncture on the climb, but the Australian remained calm, breezing past the strugglers to return to the peloton. 

Up front, Jan Christen (UAE Team Emirates-XRG) and Jardi Christiaan van der Lee (EF Education-EasyPost) pushed on, opening an advantage over the rest of the breakaway. Van der Lee took maximum points over the first climb, before the duo were shortly caught by their companions.

The breakaway was reduced in size on the category three Doues and category one Lin Nor climb, with Igor Arrieta (UAE Team Emirates-XRG) trying to briefly go solo. 

Ciccone claimed maximum points atop the category one climb, indicating his ambitions to fight for the blue jersey.

The Italian tested the waters once more, accelerating with 42.7km remaining, but to no avail. 

With 40km to go, race leader Eulálio found himself towards the back of the peloton, as Visma continued to drive the pace over the summit of the climb to Verrogne. Throughout the stage, Visma maintained a strong pace, keeping the breakaway in check with exceptional work from Tim Rex (Visma | Lease a Bike).

Gianmarco Garofoli (Soudal Quick-Step) was the first to push the pace at the foot of the final climb to Pila, which began with just under 17km remaining. Jan Hirt (NSN) and De la Cruz were also spritely at the front. 

In the peloton, Victor Campenaerts (Visma | Lease a Bike) settled into his effort as the gap to the breakaway continued to close, and the maglia rosa continued to hang precariously at the back of the peloton. 

Einer Rubio (Movistar) accelerated with 10.2km to go from the breakaway, with Ciccone, Jan Hirt (NSN) and Aleksandr Vlasov (Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe) immediately responding. Not satisfied, Rubio went again with 9.6km to go but once more he couldn’t break free.

Wout Poels (Unibet Rose Rockets) and Enric Mas (Movistar) also tried to go clear in what was becoming a tug of war among the breakaway contenders, but the pace of Visma meant their advantage was in peril.

Campenaerts finished his effort with 9.2km to go, handing the baton over to Sepp Kuss (Visma | Lease a Bike). The damage was evident quickly as Eulálio, Derek Gee-West (Lidl-Trek), Mathys Rondel (Tudor) and Ben O’Connor (Jayco AlUla) were distanced with 8.7km to go. 

Davide Piganzoli (Visma | Lease a Bike) took over from Kuss with 6.6km to go, with Vingegaard’s inevitable move on the horizon. 

Ciccone threw one last roll of the dice with 5.5km to go, followed by Rubio, but with their advantage less than 15 seconds, the duo were resigned to their fate, and they were caught with just over 5km to go, as Giulio Pellizzari (Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe) was distanced. 

Piganzoli’s pace rode all but Vingegaard and Gall off his wheel, and the Dane struck out with 4.6km to go. Gall was unable to match the acceleration of Vingegaard, choosing to settle into his own tempo, with Piganzoli holding onto the wheel of the Austrian. 

Jai Hindley (Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe) distanced Thymen Arensman (Netcompany-Ineos) as he attempted to bridge across to Gall and Piganzoli, and the Australian had the help of his teammate Pellizzari, who managed to recover from his earlier struggles.

Piganzoli was distanced by Gall and caught by the Red Bull duo with 2km to go, who closed in on the Australian towards the finish line, but Vingegaard was in a league of his own.