Jai Hindley and Giulio Pellizzari lived to fight another day at the Giro d'Italia on Wednesday, happy the GC contenders let the breakaway fight for victory so they could recover from the illness that has derailed their GC hopes.
The Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe pair lost time to Jonas Vingegaard (Visma-Lease a Bike) on the mountain stage to Corno alla Scale and the time trial as they fought illness. They limited their losses to the Dane in the time trial but other GC rivals gained time on them. Hindley is sixth overall, 2:39 down on Vingegaard, Pellizzari is ninth at 3:09.
Pellizzari was just happy to get through another stage and reach Chiavari. Thursday's stage from Imperia to Novi Ligure is 175km long but largely flat and expected to be a day for the sprinters.
"I suffered a lot today too but we saved our skins again," Pellizzari told Italian RAI radio and Cyclingnews at the finish line.
The young Italian was hit by a stomach virus that stopped him from eating during stage 9 but had avoided any other problems. Hindley has been suffering with a different problem.
"Fortunately it's only the one virus, there's nothing else, one is enough…" Pellizzari said.
"It's hard to recover when racing, we can only hope to gradually recover. Lets hope we can have an easier day on Thursday to Novi Ligure."
The illness and disappointment of losing time and perhaps any hope of GC podium place has been a test for the 22-year-old Italian's character but he was keen to race on to salvage something from his race.
"We've worked hard to do something at the Giro, so we've got to fight on while we can," he said.
Hindley was of the same philosophy. He had to go deep in the Massa time trial, while trying to recover. He looked pale and ashen-faced after the time trial and at the stage 11 start in Porcari but has perhaps overcome the worst of his illness.
"I didn't have the stomach problem, I had something else. I'm not 100%. I looked how I felt after the time trial," Hindley said.
"The day before the rest day I wasn't feeling so healthy. Fortunately I could recover a little on the rest day.
"For me a 42 km time trial isn't much fun when I'm not 100%. It was a really testing. I was happy to get through it. I'd hoped for a better ride and could have done better if I'd been 100%.
"I was about 25 watts under my normal pace. It was still a pretty hard effort but the pacing was key. If you blew your doors off for the last half, it was endless. I managed OK but just wasn't feeling my best. I had to suffer to survive."
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