Jonas Vingegaard moved into the leader’s pink jersey with victory on stage 14 of the Giro d’Italia to Pila.
Vingegaard’s third stage victory of his debut Giro came by a gap of 49 seconds from Felix Gall, while Afonso Eulalio – dropped midway up the final climb – finished two minutes 49 seconds down in 15th place as his nine-day stint in pink came to an end.
Vingegaard had made clear at the start of the day he only had eyes for victory on this 133km mountain stage from Aosta and his Visma-Lease a Bike team went about delivering as they controlled the pace from the off, keeping a tight leash on a 23-strong breakaway.
Eulalio began to drop off the group of favourites with 8.5km of the final 16km climb still to go as Vingegaard’s team-mate Sepp Kuss set a punishing pace.
The last of the escapees was caught with five kilometres left and moments later Vingegaard launched an attack that nobody else could follow, with Gall pacing himself just ahead of a group of Jai Hindley, Giulio Pellizzari, and Vingegaard’s team-mate Davide Piganzoli.
Vingegaard now leads overall by two minutes 26 seconds from Eulalio, with Gall third, a further 24 seconds back, ahead of Sunday’s flat stage into Milan.
PA
