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emirates teamIn Saturday’s opening individual time trial, expect to provide a strong collective challenge to Remco Evenepoel (Soudal-QuickStep) and the other Giro d’Italia GC contenders.
Excellent third place for UAE Joao Almeidawho wore pink throughout 15 stages of the 2020 Giro d’Italia and scored top-ten finishes for teammates Jay Vine and Brandon McNulty.
Evenepoel easily played his top performance in the opening TT of 19.6 kilometers, but from the overall situation, there are all signs that UAE is clearly in the leading position.
Asked if his debut had exceeded his expectations, Almeida gave a typically diplomatic answer of “yes, a little”.
“I know what I’m capable of, but I’m a little bit surprised by my time. The team has been doing some good work, though, so we’re really happy.”
As for Evenepoel’s dominance in the time trial – beating Filippo Ganna (Ineos Grenadiers) by 22 seconds and Almeida by 29 seconds – the 24-year-old from Portugal admits the Belgian has outperformed The level he can achieve has been expected.
“I thought he would win, but it’s really a big advantage, even better than I thought, so congratulations to him, he deserved it,” said Almeida. “For us, in a good way It’s important to start and then let the game go, so we’re in a really good position.”
McNulty spent a brief stint in the hot spot as interim stage leader, but admitted he had no idea how his performance would ultimately stack up to others in the field.
In fact, he ended up leading the mountain class, finishing the fastest time trial fourth climb, ahead of Tao Geoghegan Hart (Ineos Grenadiers) and Almeida.
“It’s been really good, my legs are good, but I’m not sure where I’m going to end up, the top 10 is pretty good,” McNulty said.
“Honestly, I was surprised when they said I got the KoM jersey and I had to wait for it after I got stuck. I was surprised, but it would be nice to wear the jersey going into tomorrow.”
“I knew I had to pace myself and climb hard, but I didn’t really expect to be the fastest. It was fun.”
instead of targeting trip to italy Overall, McNulty said he’s considering other options. “I want to win a stage or two. Obviously, GC has Vine and Almeida, so I’ll try to protect them, but I want to win something.”
What happens in terms of GC-wise or stages is in the future, but in the here and now, McNulty agrees the team can leave feeling very happy with their collective time trial performance First day at the Giro.
“We put a lot of effort into the time trial material,” he said, “because everything is new. So it’s great to see that it all paid off and we’re competitive and there.”
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