Juan Ayuso might have stood atop the podium at Itzulia Basque Country as the overall winner last week, but the biggest winner was possibly not the Spaniard, but his UAE Team Emirates teammate Tadej Pogačar.
The 25-year-old wasn’t present in the north of Spain, and so dodged the misfortune and injuries that befell his rivals for the Tour de France. It’s counterintuitive that avoiding racing makes you more of a favourite, but at Itzulia, Remco Evenepoel (Soudal Quick-Step), Jonas Vingegaard (Visma-Lease a Bike) and Primož Roglič (Bora-Hansgrohe) were all impacted to different extents by the horror crash on stage four.
