Ineos Grenadiers could hardly have bounced back harder at the Giro d'Italia on Saturday as just hours after a major blow when time trial star Filippo Ganna had to quit with COVID-19, their two contenders Tao Geoghegan Hart and Geraint Thomas joined Primož Roglič in dropping Remco Evenepoel.
When Roglič initially delivered a searing attack on the short but painfully steep I Cappuccini climb and gapped Evenepoel, initially nobody was able to follow the Slovenian.
But by the summit, Thomas and Geoghegan Hart managed to both distance the Belgian and bridge across to Roglič.
After a tricky, technical descent, the trio worked briefly together to open up a gap of 14 seconds on Evenepeol. It's not the biggest time gain but is a psychological blow against a rider who has shown no vulnerability to date.
"We said in the meeting before the stage that we wanted to try to take to time on anyone we could but also stay safe and ride our race and we did all of those so it was really good," Geoghegan Hart told reporters as he warmed down.
"A lot of people have big ideas, we just have to do our own race, sometimes go, sometimes be patient, and keep doing that in the next days."
"I was really happy me and G were there in the mix and on the front, and it's another big day tomorrow."
Having gained 14 seconds on Evenepoel and the rest of the field, Geoghegan Hart has moved up sixth and is 48 seconds behind race leader Andreas Leknessund (Team DSM). Thomas also gained a spot overall and is now fifth, 44 seconds down.
Geoghegan Hart said he was glad to see that while Ineos Grenadiers were not the only team making an effort to shred on the three final ascents on the stage, with the race going twice up the I Cappuccini climb and sandwiched between those two, one trip over the category 2 Monte delle Cesane. He singled out Jumbo-Visma and UAE Team Emirates as the other squads that had made the main contribution.
"It's good to see people wanting to take it on because so far race hasn't opened up as expected. But often with some of the stages coming in 8, 10 days time, it's natural people are patient and waiting," Geoghegan Hart said..
"The Giro hasn't begun until the last week so for now it's just about staying in the game."
Roglič's vicious acceleration initially proved impossible for any rider to match. But Thomas expressed satisfaction with being able to deploy the same climbing strategy that served him so well in last year's Tour, of taking things steadily rather than doing too deep, and gradually regaining ground on more aggressive attackers. Thomas also managed to drop Evenepoel near the summit, which is hardly the smallest of morale boosts.
"At the bottom Roglič accelerated, it wasn't crazy, but he went a lot harder than I really wanted, so I tried to ride at my pace," Thomas said. "I stayed with Remco, and then with a kilometre to go, Remco tried to close the gap and I just kept going, let him go.
"I looked behind and there was [Eddie] Dunbar (Jayco-AlUla) and João [Almeida], people like that. So I let them do a bit, biding my time and then Tao was thinking exactly the same as me basically and we both accelerated the last 400 metres or so. He closed to Roglič, I was 10 metres off, then Roglič went over the top, and the three of us came to the finish."
Thomas explained that it was hard to give Roglič a turn and try and expand the trio's advantage because on such a technical, twisty finish, "you didn't want to be dive-bombing him and taking us all out." He did, in any case, come through in the last kilometre.
Thomas was happiest because after his first ascent of I Capuccini did not go too well when teammate Laurens de Plus laid down a strong pace, the second time he was clearly in a much better place.
"But I'm always like that," Thomas concluded. "I'm a kind of slow engine to get going these days."
The rider who was firing on all cylinders was Roglič, about whom a smoke screen of rumours concerning a possible positive test for COVID seem to be part of what Thomas called 'mind games'.
"It was not bad for a guy with COVID," Thomas said with a wry smile about Roglič's performance. "He told me yesterday that he had COVID. So I said OK, stay away from me, then."
The Briton put the whole 'COVID' incident down to Roglič being engaged in some psychological warfare, of the classic type where riders try to convince the opposition that they are in worse shape than in reality.
"He always says he's got bad legs. 'Ah, the race is hard, eh, this is too hard, eh, I go home.' And then he goes and wins by ten minutes. Who knows with him, it's all mind games."
However, Roglič is far from being the only rider to try to lull the opposition into thinking he is not as strong as in reality, Thomas said he was not taken in by any of it: "Almeida said to me he had bad legs today as well. I just think if you really did, why would you tell me? I wouldn't tell him."
He also expressed doubts that the situation had now changed regarding Evenepoel, given that rather than the trio getting a massive time gap it was only 14 seconds.
"When it comes to Remco, you expect him to be the one lighting up the race so when he doesn't and loses a bit of time, it's a bit of a surprise," he said.
"But at the end of the day, it's seconds, so it might be an off day, but he's a special, special guy. So I'm certainly not going to get carried away."
He was equally dismissive of the idea that the hierarchy of the Giro had changed as a result of the appearance of a first chink in Evenepoel's armour.
"I don't think so, it's the same as before," he argued. "You've got the main two everybody's talking about and then a group of strong guys under that."
However, Thomas and Geoghegan Hart's performance has not only brought them close to Roglič and Evenepoel but also allowed the two to gain time on the rest of the field. Sunday's time trial will likely prove far more important in the long term than Saturday's skirmish, but on the eve of such an important test, those kinds of morale boosts for the two Britons can hardly be underestimated.
