'Need to be attentive 100%' - Geraint Thomas warns of potential GC headache on tricky Giro d'Italia stage 2 finale after Netcompany Ineos escape hectic opener unscathed

With a chaotic opening Giro d'Italia stage in Bulgaria navigated safely by Netcompany Ineos, their attention and that of the other GC-focused teams turn to the tricky, punchy finale of stage 2 into Veliko Tarnovo, where Director of Racing Geraint Thomas is preparing for the first potential GC shake-up.

Thomas, a former Tour de France winner and runner-up at the Giro from 2023, knows all too well about Grand Tour stages where you won't win the race, but you certainly can lose it, and he's expecting Saturday's finale to fall right into that category.

"In terms of being decisive for GC, I'm not so sure, but it's definitely going to be on it, and you need to be attentive 100%," Thomas told Cyclingnews outside the team bus after stage 1 in Burgas.

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"That last climb tops out with 10km to go; I would expect it to be hard up there, and full, so you've still got to be on the front. It'll be more exciting to watch."

While the stage isn't a mountain day, and the whole Bulgarian Grande Partenza is actually raced over mostly flat roads, the last categorised ascent on stage 2 will see the riders take on the Lyaskovets Monastery Pass (3.9 km at 6.8%).

And if the hectic finale on stage 1 wasn't warning enough that positioning can be vital, all of the GC teams will want to be front and centre when this climb arrives in the final 20km, with two small sections of cobbles and a steep climb to the line in Bulgaria's historical and spiritual capital still to come.

Thomas isn't specifically expecting heavy GC favourite Jonas Vingegaard (Visma-Lease a Bike) to light it up, as he waits for the higher terrain to make his mark, but did single out UAE Team Emirates-XRG as potential aggressors.

"I can't see Jonas being overly aggressive, but someone like Johnny Narváez, or these types of guys, it's a stage suited to them. For sure, they are going to be aggressive for it, I would have thought," said the Welshman of UAE.

The British team will likely be riding for Ben Turner or Filippo Ganna in the finale, as their GC riders, Egan Bernal and Thymen Arensman, try to stay safe and alert to any GC moves.

"It's sort of on the limit for Ben. If he's in a good position at the bottom, then there's no reason why he can't still be there over the top. If you go pure numbers and you say, 'If they go X amount of watts per kilo and what can he do?' then there might be a gap, but it's racing, isn't it? Not Formula 1.

"So him and Pippo [Ganna] have a good chance. They'll get stuck into it, and obviously the other boys have got to be there anyway, so we'll see what we can do."

Visma-Lease a Bike also confirmed that it wasn't their intention for the moment for Vingegaard to go for the finale into Veliko Ternovo, but if someone else like Red Bull-Bora-hansgrohe or UAE Team Emirates try something, it could force the Dane's hand early in the race.

"I think it's a hard final with the climb. There are still some guys who could survive it, so maybe a group of like 30 to 40 riders can go to the finish line, but it depends also on which teams will want to go for it," said Visma DS Marc Reef to Cyclingnews at the finish.

"It is also a technical final, with two short sections of cobbles. The last roads go a bit up from 2km to go, then a bit downhill to the last 300 metres, which are uphill again. Quite some riders will have an opportunity."

Would Jonas be one of them? "Our first intention is to get safely through these first few days on the right track to Italy. Our focus in the first place is on – you know which stages – the hard mountain top finishes," responded Reef. "I think there are other teams more interested in the stage than we are."

Ineos will be at full strength for whatever challenges come their way on the second day of racing, with Thomas confirming they all arrived at the bus safely despite the pile-up in the last kilometre.

The Welshman was marginally critical of the road narrowing before the line, but also admitted how all of the teams knew what was coming in Burgas, and said that nothing specific was to blame for the likes of Dylan Groenewegen and Kaden Groves coming down.

"Ben [Turner] was riding really well and floating there in the top 20, which is really hard to do when it's like this: chaos, just guys left and right, so wide and stuff and no real team taking it on," said Thomas, who is taking on his first Grand Tour as a staff member, not a rider at the Giro.

"Obviously, there's a crash which is not good, but luckily Ben stayed upright and the rest were OK.

"I think it's [just] Grand Tour racing. The jersey is up on the line; it's going to be chaotic no matter what they do. For me, it was big, wide roads all day, then for the last 1km, it goes down to one lane.

"It would have been nice to have just seen it continue on big roads, you know, but everyone knows it, and it is what it is. I don't think it's a major fault of anyone's, really, and that's sprinting, especially when the pink jersey is on the line."

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