24 hours after his stinging defeat in the opening time trial of Itzulia Basque Country, Juan Ayuso (Lidl-Trek) has recognised he faces a major uphill battle in trying to get back on terms with the other favourites.
Ayuso finished a considerable 1:16 down on stage winner Paul Seixas (Decathlon CGA CGM), a significant margin in anyone's book, but also well behind other heavy favourites like Primož Roglič (Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe), 28 seconds down on the flying Frenchman.
Even Isaac del Toro (UAE Team Emirates-XRG) whose time trials are not his strong point, finished 25 seconds ahead of Ayuso.
Interviews with the 2024 Itzulia Basque Country winner after stage 1 were somewhere between thin on the ground and non-existent, but at stage 2's start, Ayuso faced the media and explained he had had a complicated build-up to the Itzulia, with another training crash following his crash and abandon when leading Paris-Nice.
"I can say it was not a great day, one of the worst TT performances I can remember," he told CyclingProNet and other media. "I can compare it to one I had in the Vuelta a España 2022, but back then I had COVID-19, and this time I didn't so - no excuses."
Ayuso said that it had been a tough couple of weeks due to his training crash and prior to that the heavy fall and abandon in Paris-Nice, which had meant four days off the bike. Yet as he put it, "That's not an excuse and I hope throughout the week I can get my legs back and something out of the race."
Seven seconds ahead of Seixas in the Volta ao Algarve TT, their only head-to-head in 2026 to date against the clock prior to Itzulia, Ayuso went on to win the Portuguese season opener stage race overall. This time round, the GC could be out of reach now, it was suggested.
"I think it's really hard, seeing the time gaps and how Paul went yesterday [Monday], of course he's the clear favourite," Ayuso agreed.
"But this is a difficult race to control, any day things can change quite fast, everybody will try to attack. We're here to keep on trying."
"He will defend himself, but as I say, it's a really hard course. I think every team will try to move the race, and that suits attacking from distance and having teammates in front. He'll be put under pressure this week."
Seixas amazing performance on Monday could hardly fail to have an impact on anybody who watched it. But Ayuso pointed out that whilst during the TT there wasn't really a competition between the two, given how badly Ayuso had raced, he'd already seen for himself in earlier events this season the kind of level at which Seixas was capable of performing.
"Yesterday I fought against no-one but myself, " Ayuso said with a wry laugh, "so yesterday I can't say that much.
"But not only in Algarve, also when he raced Strade Bianche, he showed he was the last guy to put up a fight against [winner] Tadej [Pogačar]. That says a lot."
