World News – GB – Tao Geoghegan Hart hopes for ‘a good day and a little luck’ as history invites the unannounced Briton to the Giro d’Italia

The 25-year-old wins the penultimate stage at Sestriere to tie Jai Hindley at the top of the table with only the last day’s time trial remaining

A British rider was always supposed to fight for the pink jersey at this Giro d´Italia We didn’t expect it to be this one And certainly not like this

An extraordinary run will reach an extraordinary conclusion on Sunday when Tao Geoghegan Hart, not Geraint Thomas, not Simon Yates, but an unannounced 25-year-old from Hackney in east London who was not even among the top 20 favorites at the start, rolls on the starting ramp of the last day’s time trial in Milan with the aim of securing his first victory in the grand tour

Geoghegan Hart will start, against all odds, as an odds favorite, thanks to what is considered (by bookies) to be his superior timed practice skills compared to his closest rival

The truth, however, is that the situation as we approach the final day couldn’t be more delicately put. For the first time in Grand Tour history, the first and second-placed riders in the overall standings are tied at the same time

Geoghegan Hart equalized the even less advertised level of Jai Hindley [Sunweb], after beating the Australian in a two-man sprint at Sestriere on Saturday to claim his second stage victory of the race The bonus seconds Geoghegan Hart picked up on the line helped him close the slim three-second deficit he gave Hindley at the start of the day But it was the Australian who received the maglia rosa after lengthy deliberations by the race marshals, who concluded that he was 086sec ahead of the overall standings

Geoghegan Hart won’t mind The momentum is definitely with him after another excellent performance from Ineos Grenadiers, and his teammate Rohan Dennis in particular

Just like he did on the Queen stage of the race on Thursday, when he blew up the race on the Stelvio, Dennis put Geoghegan Hart’s rivals in the red with an extraordinary effort up front Even after dropping out of the rest of the field and delivering Geoghegan Hart in the final kilometers, the former TT world champion returned to help his team manager after Hindley’s attack

Wilco Kelderman [Sunweb], who started the day 12 seconds ahead of Hindley, failed to respond to Dennis The Dutchman was sidelined on Sestriere’s third and final climb, and is now in third place of the general at 1min32sec Not outside at all – on Kelderman paper is the best time of the main contenders in the GC – but a gap just now with Geoghegan Hart who, naturally, was delighted with the finish

« Certainly before the Giro, I did not expect this scenario with 15 km to do in the race », he admitted « Although it looks a lot like last year, with unexpected and young candidates

« What Rohan Dennis did for me was incredible I owe him for the Stelvio stage and for today Having a double TT world champion and the current world champion [Filippo Ganna] to me helping out like they did is fantastic, but tomorrow it will be up to me to perform against the clock « 

Can Geoghegan Hart do it? On paper he should In nine time trials, Geoghegan Hart won Hindley’s number seven times It is true that Hindley beat the Briton by almost a minute in the first stage of the time trial in Sicily three weeks ago But Geoghegan Hart was still riding for Thomas at this time and had no idea about the maglia rosa himself.After taking charge of the team on stage three, Geoghegan Hart got into the race and beat Hindley by more than a minute in the (admittedly much longer) 34km time trial. during the 14th stage

History awaits a man who until this race had only won two stages of the Tour of the Alps as a professional racer If he can succeed, Geoghegan Hart would become just the second British driver to win the race, after Chris Froome in 2018, and the fifth British driver to win a grand lap after Froome, who won seven in total, and Bradley Wiggins , Geraint Thomas and Simon Yates, who all won one each

It would also be the second consecutive Grand Tour in which a rider won the race on the final day of competition, not wearing the leader’s jersey until then, after 21-year-old Tadej Pogacar destroyed his compatriot Primoz Roglic in the penultimate day of last month’s Tour de France time trial 2020 was a brutal year for the sport, and cycling has not escaped unscathed, with teams, sponsors and races all going to the wall But the race was exciting

« I am very happy for myself, for my team and for the Giro, » said Geoghegan Hart who was reportedly flown by helicopter to his team’s hotel last night as Sunweb was scheduled to make the trip from 3 hours by bus

« Today was a great day I felt great the whole way [until the final climb] I was rather focused on the bonus seconds at the end and my race. tomorrow will be a question of stages, the route is short, I hope to have a good day and a little luck, then we’ll see

« It’s a bike race Anything can happen [tomorrow], especially after 20 days of racing in difficult conditions We’ll see how it goes – I’ll do my best and can’t change anything beyond that »

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Giro d’Italia, Jai Hindley, Tao Geoghegan Hart, Team INEOS, Team Sunweb