Giro d’Italia stage 1: Arensman and Bardet feel the power of Tadej Pogačar’s shock and awe

Tadej Pogačar (UAE Team Emirates) blew the Giro d’Italia apart on the very first day, setting an aggressive pace in the tough opening stage.

And several surprise names fell foul of that pace, with Romain Bardet (dsm-firmenich PostNL), Thymen Arensman (Ineos Grenadiers) and Luke Plapp (Jayco-AlUla) all losing significant time and puncturing their overall hopes.

Arensman, one of the favorites for an overall top 10 finish in Rome or even a podium finish, was the biggest victim of UAE Team Emirates’ blistering pace on the Category 2 Colle Maddalena just 20km before the finish in Turin.

The Dutchman stopped early as Mikkel Bjerg (UAE Team Emirates) led the peloton up the climb, and he quickly became distanced and isolated.

Bardet and Giro debutant Plapp were soon also spit out at the back as Rafal Majka pushed the pace further, with the Frenchman soon 1:10 behind the peloton and Arensman even worse off at 1:24 on the climb.

Arensman eventually crossed the line 2:17 behind, his hopes for the overall rankings possibly already over, while Bardet and Plapp both lost a total of 57 seconds. Veteran Nairo Quintana (Movistar) also had a bad start to his Giro and crossed the line at the same time as Bardet and Plapp.

In better news for Ineos Grenadiers, Jhonatan Narváez won the stage, with team leader Geraint Thomas looking strong despite pressure from UAE Team Emirates on the short, sharp 140km stage.

Thomas and teammate Filippo Ganna made it back safely into the second group, with the Welshman finishing 10th, just 10 seconds behind Narváez but losing 14 seconds to Pogačar due to the bonus seconds on the line.

Ben O’Connor (Decathlon AG2R La Mondiale), Dani Martínez (Bora-Hansgrohe), Damiano Caruso (Bahrain Victorious) and Cian Uijtdebroeks (Visma-Lease a Bike) all minimized their time losses. They came home with Thomas in the main group, alongside another veteran in Julian Alaphilippe (Soudal-QuickStep).

Ineos Grenadiers CEO John Allert played down Arensman’s loss of time and focused on the strong performances of Narváez and Thomas.

“It’s clearly a long race, we don’t know yet what happened to Thymen,” he said at the finish.

‘He’ll come back to us tonight and we’ll take a look. But at the end of the day, we still have plenty of cards to play in this race and there are 21 stages, as I said, and we’re going to make sure we get there at the end.

With much damage already done and twenty stages to go, the rankings already appear to have been shaken up, and Pogačar can still consider it a successful day in the saddle, despite failing to claim the maglia rosa on day 1 .