Felix Gall (Decathlon CMA CGM) emerged as Jonas Vingegaard’s biggest contender at the Giro d’Italia after the first summit finish of the 2026 race, finishing second behind the Dane atop Blockhaus with only a narrow 13-second deficit.
Vingegaard and his Visma-Lease a Bike team took control of the race on the 13.6km, before he launched his first attack 5.5km from the top. Only Giulio Pellizzari (Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe) was able to follow, but he overextended and was dropped a kilometre later, before dropping several positions in the final 4km.
After his big day out at the Giro, Gall sits third overall, 3:34 behind pink jersey Afonso Eulálio (Bahrain Victorious), who shipped heaps of time across Blockhaus‘s brutal exposed slopes, but only 17 seconds behind Vingegaard, and with a gap of at least 51 seconds to all of his other GC rivals.
With a top-five finish at the Tour de France already on his palmarès, Austria’s Gall is among the best pure climbers in the world, also winning the queen stage of the 2023 Tour atop the Col de la Loze. However, he knows Vingegaard has a big advantage over him: time trialling.
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