Derek Gee-West has had a great relationship with the Giro d'Italia in his still young road career, having broken through as a rider chasing breakaways in 2023 and finished fourth overall just 12 months ago, but as he heads into his third appearance, he's been forced to admit that a flying start is unlikely.
The Canadian champion missed his team's pre-race altitude camp in Sierra Nevada after still needing to recover from the illness which forced him out of the Volta a Catalunya in March.
Article continues belowStarting somewhat blind in terms of his shape compared to his rivals, this has allowed him to take the pressure off himself as one of Lidl-Trek's three leaders – with Giulio Ciccone chasing stages and Jonathan Milan looking to dominate the sprints and win the first maglia rosa.
That was also his last race of that season, other than at the Canadian National Championships, before his drawn-out split from Israel-Premier Tech saw him enter the off-season with no coach and considerable uncertainty surrounding his future in the sport.
He landed on his feet at Lidl-Trek in January as an immediate GC hope for the Giro d'Italia, with the podium in mind. Now, after more disruption amid his first season on the German squad, Gee-West will perhaps need to buy into some of that resilience before he tries to peak at the right time.
"I haven't had a clean run. I haven't had great performances this spring, but I'm happy with where I am physically in the prep," he said on Wednesday.
"If the legs show up right away, that's great. If I struggle in the first week and the legs show up in the third week, then that's great. And I've done what I can, so if the legs never show up, obviously, then we'll go back to the drawing board and figure out what happened, but I'm really looking forward to it."
If he can make it through the typical chaos of a Grand Tour start, and the early climbing test in the run-in to the finale of stage 2 in Bulgaria, Gee-West should have time to come into form just before Blockhaus on stage 7 and the key 42-kilometre stage 10 time trial, where he could have a real advantage over some of his fellow podium chasers.
But he was frank, as all of the other GC competitors are, about the prospect of going for the overall win, due to the presence of a certain Jonas Vingegaard (Visma-Lease a Bike), the heavy favourite to win pink and complete the full set of Grand Tour victories.
"There is definitely a number one favourite in Jonas that's way ahead of everyone on paper," he said, before answering honestly whether anyone could hope to match the Dane on the hardest mountains.
"On paper, you would say no. But at the same time, you know, bike racing isn't on paper, so… I have the same perspective that I think that everyone from the outside has, which is that yes, it does seem like there's a favourite that will probably ride away with the race, but that's not taking into account the realities of bike racing, so we'll see."
Vingegaard has been warned constantly of the potential dangers presented by the Giro that differ from those in play at the Tour de France and Vuelta a España, where he has won previously, with the variable weather conditions playing a huge part in that.
The attrition and difficulty of the Giro, too, is something that Gee-West believes has given rise to his successes racing la corsa rosa, knowing full well that his larger frame is better suited to the cold and rain, which can dampen his rivals' climbing skills on the Giro's most brutal days.
It's fair to say Gee-West will be hoping to bring some of the cold Canadian weather and rain with him once the race reaches high ground in Italy.
"It's a very attritional race, the Giro is every single time, and I think that's why I enjoy it," he said. "The third week makes such a big difference, and I think the Giro has always been famous for having the hardest stages, the worst weather, all this.
"That really appeals to me as a bike rider in the sense just that it feels like the purest of bike races, the really attritional as opposed to maybe the punchier Vuelta, or anything like that. I've always liked the idea of the Giro, but having only done two and found success there, there can always be one that kind of throws off that trend, but hopefully it's not this one."
Even with his far from ideal preparation for the Giro, Gee-West is hoping to maintain his "100% success rate at Grand Tours" for the goals he's set, but that isn't specifically a number in the top 10, as he looks to simply find his best in the third week and see where that lands him, but "hopefully the number at the end is low."
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