Why Vingegaard’s Pila attack was his best Giro performance yet

Stage 14 featured 4,200 meters of climbing in only 133 kilometers. That meant the stage was up and down from start to finish. In total, there were only 25-30km of flat valley roads throughout the entire stage. 

The breakaway battle began from kilometer zero, with more than 20 riders going up the road on the first climb of the day. Unfortunately for them, Team Visma | Lease a Bike had a plan: they were going for the stage win with Jonas Vingegaard. 

The Dane even told his teammates during the stage that he had great legs. What does that mean for the rest of the peloton? It means that Visma LAB will push the pace for as hard and as long as possible. Vingegaard shows his best legs under immense amounts of fatigue. When his competitors are already on the limit, that’s when Vingegaard dances away to victory. 

Stage 9 on Blockhaus was different – the peloton was relatively fresh, and Vingegaard did ~6.4w/kg for 39 minutes to take the win. But now it was Stage 14, two-thirds of the way through the Giro, and the Visma LAB domestiques had just ridden at 400w on all of the major climbs. The pain face on Tim Rex proved it. 

The stage was set for an epic final climb. It was more than 16km at 7% to the finish in Pila (Gressan), a long climb that would suit the likes of Vingegaard, Felix Gall, and Thymen Arensman. We’ve seen Vingegaard pull out 30 to 40 minute performances at more than 6.5w/kg (Plateau de Beille and Mont Ventoux), but could he do it again today? 

With just under 5km to go on Pila, Vingegaard attacked at 660w, according to Velon’s power data, and went solo in search of victory. The Dane averaged 390w during his solo effort, an estimated 6.8w/kg for 12 minutes. Not only did Vingegaard take the stage win, but he did so with confidence and control, traits we haven’t seen much of in this Giro. 

Vingegaard – Pila
Time: 39:56
Estimated Average Power: 6.4w/kg
Final 12-Minute Attack: ~6.8w/kg

Gee-West: 42:10 at 408w (5.9w/kg)

We use as much power data as possible when calculating these values, but when power data is absent, we estimate the values using a combination of public Strava files, Velon CC data, and our own calculations. Our calculations use a combination of VAM, speed, time, rider weight, and historical data.

If you look at the estimated power, Vingegaard’s 40-minute performance was nearly identical to Blockhaus. But I’d say this performance on Pila was much more impressive. The peloton had been pushing the pace all day on Stage 14, as opposed to the relaxed pace for the first few hours of the Blockhaus stage. Riders also have twice as many stages in their legs, and perhaps the most underrated factor of the day was weather. 

Stage 14 was one of, if not the, hottest stage of this year’s Giro. Gee’s head unit read a steady 30 degrees Celsius on the final climb of the day. That is more than enough to sap some energy from the legs, especially since conditions were already hot at the stage’s start. 

The most telling factor in Vingegaard’s performance is the way he was able to accelerate in the final third of the climb. With an average output of 6.4w/kg for the climb, including 6.8w/kg for the final 12 minutes, that means Vingegaard was riding well below his limit for the first 28 minutes of climbing. What was that limit? Just about 6–6.2w/kg.

For most riders, even the top professionals, 6.2w/kg for half an hour would be the limit. The fact that Vingegaard was able to push nearly 7w/kg for 12 minutes after that kind of effort is a sign of building form. 

The Dane is looking stronger than in the first week of the Giro, and history tells us that he may be even stronger in the third week. We won’t have to wait long to find out since Stage 16 features a long uphill finish with an average gradient of 8%.