For all the questions over his performance in Tuesday's time trial at the Giro d'Italia, you'd think that Jonas Vingegaard had a total shocker, an out-of-character performance, and shipped loads of time on GC.
Commentators were calling it a disaster, a surprising loss, a poor sign of things to come in his GC campaign. But is any of that right at all, or is it just hyperbole?
In reality, Vingegaard took on a 42km, pan-flat time trial – not the kind of TT that would ever suit him, nor has he excelled in before – and did better than 90% of his GC rivals, cutting a whole two minutes out of his deficit to the pink jersey.
They're also riders who have yet to come close to Vingegaard's climbing ability so far in this Giro, so does it really matter if he loses time to them in a TT? It's not like there's another TT coming where there might be more time losses – that was the only one. The only rider who has looked to rival Vingegaard on the climbs, Felix Gall, lost a minute and a half on Tuesday.
But despite this truth, there was a lot of questioning over what this performance meant for Vingegaard, whether he was severely off the pace, not going well in this Giro, even that it was a sign he might struggle to win the overall – despite being 1:30 clear of his nearest GC rivals. (There were also plenty of comments and reactions disagreeing with these takes, and doing exactly what I'm doing here, contextualising and being realistic about Vingegaard's ride.)
Now, the reaction to Tuesday's stage was not a first in this Giro; Vingegaard has been questioned on his supposed lack of dominance since he came to this race. It's true that he arrived as the overwhelming favourite, and it's true that he's not yet been in pink, nor put in any race-ending time gaps to his opponents yet. But here's the thing; that's actually totally normal.
In the era of Tadej Pogačar, who when he last raced and won the Giro wore pink from stage 2 until the very end, we've come to think that overwhelming favourite always equals destroying the field from day one. But that is not the only marker of success, and the fact that Vingegaard has won his two climbing stages by margins of 13 and 12 seconds respectively is not tantamount to failure.
They perhaps are smaller margins than we expected, or have become used to, but winning is winning, and no one has managed to match or beat Vingegaard in the climbs so far. And indeed, there's probably a good reason why Vingegaard's performances have not been domineering.
We must remember that this Giro is not actually even his main goal of the season. That's the Tour de France, where he will be up against a much tougher rival in Tadej Pogačar, and he and his team have been clear that they want to use the Giro as a good preparation for the Tour, not expend all their energy here and have nothing left for July.
To be honest, it would almost be worrying if he was absolutely trouncing the field in Italy right now. It would be a sign of either giving more than he needs to or peaking too early, both of which would not be good.
In truth, Vingegaard is probably hoping to win by using the least amount of energy possible, which might also mean quite small margins. It doesn't particularly matter if he wins by 30 seconds or five minutes, or if he wears pink for 10 days or one, all that matters is that he's wearing it on the final day in Rome.
Pogačar may have lured us all into thinking that the only way to win is to do it by 10 minutes, but that is no way to be expected, nor the only measure of success. We know by now that Vingegaard is not interested in records and excess in the way that Pogačar is, he's more focused on the winning itself, and that's fine.
Indeed, pre-Pogačar, that was utterly normal, and already winning two stages of a Grand Tour by stage 9 would be a pretty good thing for most GC contenders. But Pogačar's reshaping of Grand Tour racing has also warped our own perception, and is what leads us to thinking that gaining time on all but one or two rivals is actually a loss.
Time trial hyperbole aside, let's be real about the facts here. Jonas Vingegaard is currently closer than anyone else to the pink jersey, and he's hardly been challenged on any of the climbs so far, winning solo, with a gap each time, and the hardest mountains are very much still to come. At this point in time, it very much looks like Vingegaard is going to win the Giro.
It might be fair to say that Vingegaard probably is not going to win by nine minutes like Tadej Pogačar did, but nothing has happened to suggest he's not still the favourite to win, and indeed, winning by a more conservative margin might be key to challenging the Slovenian when it comes to July.
Who will challenge Jonas Vingegaard at this year's Giro d'Italia? Subscribe to Cyclingnews for unlimited access to our coverage of the Corsa Rosa. Enjoy unrivalled reporting from our team of journalists on the ground, including breaking news, analysis, and more, from every stage as it happens, plus access to the Cyclingnews app to follow the action on the go! Find out more.
