The first Australian to win the Giro in 113 years of history came with the lesson learned. "I was not going to allow 2020 to happen to me again," Jai Hindley said as soon as the pink race was over, in memory of the pandemic edition, the confined world, isolated sport and the pending races of the positives. Covid. The 26-year-old cycling kangaroo, a native of distant Perth, lost the 2020 edition to Britain's Tao Geoghegan in the closing time trial, which was then held in Milan and yesterday at the Verona Arena. Hindley, a runner who has gone half unnoticed in his professional performance except in that 2020 event, praises cycling in his country and his idol Cadel Evans (winner of the 2011 Tour) in a boring and sparkless Giro that the Spanish have not improved .
Mikel Landa finished third, as in 2015, his only podium in 17 majors. Pello Bilbao, fifth without great fanfare beyond regularity. And Movistar without prominence or success. Only Juanpe López, ten days in pink, tenth overall and best youngster in the race (24 years old), brings freshness and grace. The Spanish cyclists did not win any stage last year in the Giro, the Tour and the Vuelta, and they continue in that closed circle.
Hindley dusts off Australia's cycling history. A review in which Phil Anderson is indisputable, that eighties rider who became the first non-European rider to wear the yellow jersey of the Tour. He was fifth in 1982. Then came many riders or sprinters (Neil Stephens, Robbie McEwen, Michael Rogers, Bradley McGee, Stuart O'Grady, Rohan Dennis, Caleb Ewan...), some off-roaders (Porte), climbers (Ben O' Connor, Jack Haig) and the most famous (Cadel Evans) and his unmistakable style on the bike, half lopsided but effective. Australia always had something to say in this sport. And Hindley is an extension of that tradition.
He has been the winner of a languid race, without an attacking vocation, of many allowed escapes, of leaders who have barely been seen and without hot spots to remember. The ascent to the Blockhaus, that defeat on the way to Turin and the last kilometers of the Marmolada where the Australian cemented his success. A Giro without drive, always looking to the day after, without much warrior initiative and a more bland route than usual.
Landa's podium is an unusual image of regularity that verifies the cyclist from Alava, but also exposes his limitations. There is always someone better than him to win any race. Movistar was disappointing, very little presence, Valverde can not always solve.
Spanish cycling took the joy of Juanpe López, author of a great number with his episode in pink, in a very honorable defense. He looks more like a regular top-10 rider than a winner.
The brightest was, again, Mathieu van der Poel. Brilliant in his staging, winner of a stage, leader of the Giro, always the protagonist, with charisma for the public, present in the breakaways, threatening by habit, he endured until the end, until the last time trial (the one won by Sobrero), with a permanent option of victory, the only word that seems to make sense for this phenomenon that points to the brilliance of the Tour again.
