The general classification battle at a Grand Tour can often be like a chess game. Every move needs to be calculated, considered, and made with the endgame in sight. The use of energy, how riders are recovering, what they are eating, how they are sleeping, all play a part in the outcome of the three-week race. However, for Grand Tours, like with chess, most important of all is to have your team intact. Primož Roglič (Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe) knows this all too well — he has been around too long, has won too many races and has crashed too many times himself, to know the impact of losing a key domestique. So, the loss of Jai Hindley in the chaotic and crash-marred stage six of the Giro d’Italia will be sorely felt by the main favourite for the maglia rosa.
It would be a major disservice to call Hindley a mere pawn in the Red Bull roster. The Australian won the Giro in 2022 and Red Bull would have been hoping that he would stay high up on GC, acting as a foil for other teams to worry about. He was also set to be Roglič’s key mountain superdomestique for the Apennines and Alpine tests to come. Alongside last year’s second-place finisher Daniel Martínez, young talent Giulio Pellizzari and Hindley, Red Bull have amassed a climbing squad, which on paper should be attempting to try and challenge the likes of UAE Team Emirates-XRG and Visma-Lease a Bike, cycling’s two super teams. Super teams have superdomestiques; riders who have the potential to challenge for GC results themselves but instead ride in the service of their team leader. As a Grand Tour winner himself, Hindley, like Sepp Kuss for Visma, fits this exact mould. So, how will his loss affect Roglič’s assault on the pink jersey?
Now with Hindley out, Red Bull will undoubtedly have to change their tactics over the next two weeks. With multiple threats on GC, a team can force other teams to chase down attacks. With one of these key threats no longer in the race, the team could be more hesitant to attack the race themselves. The loss of Hindley also affects different tactical approaches. If they had plans to use their mountain domestiques like Hindley, Martínez and Pellizzari to pace on the front to whittle down the group and isolate the likes of Juan Ayuso (UAE Team Emirates-XRG) and Richard Carapaz (EF Education-EasyPost), they will have to think again because without the Aussie, they could risk blowing up their own riders, leaving Roglič to fend for himself.
Primož Roglič in the pink jersey after the stage two time trial at the Giro (Image: Zac Williams / SWpix.com)
A leader fending for themself is fine until they encounter any difficulties, with fatigue, crashes or mechanicals. Roglič doesn’t have a great track record of always staying on top of either of these situations, so having a teammate around him would be preferable. Martínez and Pellizzari are capable of going far into the mountain stages in the front group, but with Hindley gone, Red Bull are less likely to be the aggressors themselves. However, one advantage that the team currently has is that they don’t need to be aggressive. Roglič is sitting nicely in second place in the overall classification. Thanks to his storming time trial on stage two, he has 18 seconds over Ayuso, with another time trial to come. Although 18 seconds may not seem like much, when the Slovenian won the 2023 Giro, at 14 seconds, his overall margin to second place, Geraint Thomas, was smaller than his current gap. So, it’s up to the other teams to find time somewhere.
This is where Hindley’s abandonment may change the way the race plays out over the next two weeks. Other teams need to drop Roglič to gain time, and with one less domestique there to help him, it has become considerably easier to isolate him. The most likely squad to do so are UAE, who themselves are stacked full of superdomestique talent. Although Ayuso is their GC leader, among their ranks they have Tour de France podium-finisher Adam Yates, young talent Isaac del Toro, mountain workhorses Jay Vine and Brandon McNulty and the experienced stalwart of the team Rafał Majka. It’s a squad packed full of talent capable of blowing up a mountain stage. Moves, countermoves, and deception are all part of cycling, but sometimes what’s required is raw power. If UAE lined each one of their domestiques up on an Alpine pass and told them to let rip, very few riders would be able to hang on.
Stage six did not determine the Giro result. There is still a game with many more moving parts to come over the next 15 stages. Crashing out is the harsh reality of cycling, which Red Bull fell victim to today. Superdomestiques, like Hindley, are seen as luxuries only the most affluent teams can afford. For Roglič, it will be a luxury he will have to do without if he is going to win this Giro. Let’s hope the loss of Hindley doesn’t result in a stalemate.
