Lidl-Trek will not be one of the 14 teams walking away from this Giro d’Italia without a stage win. On the last day of what has been three weeks of racing dominated by frustration despite Giulio Ciccone’s win in the mountain classification and Derek Gee-West’s late rally to finish fifth overall on GC, Jonathan Milan secured the stage victory the German team have been craving for ever since the opening day in Bulgaria. Six times Lidl-Trek had placed a rider second or third in a stage – they had become the nearly-men. And my word how did they hate it.
In Rome they turned a page. At the last roll of the dice. Milan, stressed, angry and upset after his latest loss to Paul Magnier on stage 18, and requesting forgiveness for his positioning, was determined not to let the last opportunity pass by. An uphill final 300m in the Italian city's historic heart played into his hands and he didn't let it slip. In the final 50m especially he looked like a man reborn, his big hulking frame hunched over his bike, his shoulders rocking from side to side, and his legs pushing power approaching or even beyond 2,000 watts. When Milan is in this sort of form there's few who can stop him. For once, Magnier could not.
Lidl-Trek have endured a difficult first-half to the season with injuries to key riders Mads Pedersen and Juan Ayuso. A barren run of victories in spring accentuated their troubles and the series of near-misses at the Giro led to an even more tense team environment. It's all smiles now though. The team have their stage win through Milan and Ciccone has won his second mountains jersey.
Asked what it meant to win the stage he’d been desperate for, Milan smiled: “It’s beautiful. For three weeks we are looking for this. Winning the last stage in Rome means that we were keeping [our heads up], we never give up. We always keep fighting for the victory.
“I'm super happy to end the Giro in this way. I'm really proud of all we achieved in this Giro. We could say that we could do better in some stages, but we always give our best. We were always in the front, fighting and trying to achieve the biggest goal. With Derek [Gee-West], with Ciccone, we did amazing results and I was missing a victory. I'm just super happy to win in Rome.”
Not everyone will be celebrating tonight, though. While Visma-Lease a Bike, the team of five stage winner and GC champion Jonas Vingegaard, will be uncorking a steady stream of champagne, scenes that will be replicated by the likes of Soudal Quick-Step, Bahrain-Victorious, XDS-Astana and UAE-Team Emirates-XRG, 14 of the 23 teams will walk away empty-handed with no stage wins to show for their efforts.
Vingegaard won the maglia rosa on debut (Image: Getty)
Some have been unfortunate – Decathlon CMA CGM’s Felix Gall has finished second five times to Vingegaard en-route to placing second overall, and Movistar deserved a victory for their work on behalf of Orluis Aular – but others have barely registered their presence. Picnic PostNL Raisin are having a dreadful season, currently sitting 29th in the UCI team rankings, enough to comfortably relegated them from the WorldTour, and the best they managed here was Warren Barguil finishing ninth on stage 11 – more than two minutes behind the stage winner Jhonatan Narváez.
Others have similar tales. NSN thought they had a chance of winning a stage or two through Ethan Vernon and Corbin Strong but they never really threatened. Groupama-FDJ have also been largely absent, as have Jayco-AlUla who will be very disappointed by Ben O’Connor’s 16th place overall.
This, of course, is all part and parcel of Grand Tour racing. There are 21 stages but that doesn't mean the victories are passed around and shared equally. There is almost always at least one team who wins a handful of stages, and a few teams who collect multiple stages. But that doesn't excuse the performances of some teams, and nor does it soften the blow. Inquests will already have begun and many teams go into July's Tour de France under considerable internal pressure.
Has this been a good Giro for spectators? There have been some great individual performances (Narváez, Afonso Eulálio, and Paul Magnier), compelling storylines (Sepp Kuss’s Grand Tour trilogy and Michael Valgren’s emotional comeback) and no one can begrudge Vingeggard his place in the history books as only the eighth man in history to win all three Grand Tours.
But the race for pink has lacked tension. Vingegaard’s vast superiority meant that there was no such prospect of a battle even being held. The fight for the podium was also shorn of gripping excitement, with Gall looking more second by the day and the only doubt until late on being who'd take third sport. Jai Hindley deservedly did.
Ditto the various other classifications. It looked like the race for the points jersey would come down to a fascinating tussle between sprinter Magnier and puncheur Narváez but then the matter's withdrawal on stage 19 put paid to that. Eulálio is a surprise winner of the white jersey awarded to the best young rider but once Giulio Pellizzari admitted he didn't have the legs, Eulálio only had to worry about Vingegaard's Visma teammate Davide Piganzolo who didn't really give Eulálio fright. And in the mountains classification Ciccone was always optimistic of beating Vingegaard to the honour given the vast numbers of points on offer during day 19’s queen stage.
This writer would give the Giro 2.5 stars. Perhaps others would give it more. It's not been bad by any stretch of the imagination but it's lacked compelling drama. RCS, the race organisers, really ought to consider moving the key mountain stages to the second week to freshen things up. They almost certainly won't though.
The Giro, a race full of colour, stunning scenery and newsworthy weather (this year it was the heat rather than the rain that grabbed the attention), will be back in 11 months. Another chance for the 14 teams who leave without a stage or a jersey to right their wrongs from this year's edition. Milan saved Lidl-Trek’s blushes right at the death.
