Giro royal stage: Vingegaard helper Kuss wins

Dominator Jonas Vingegaard conceded victory on the queen stage of the Giro d'Italia to his team-mate Sepp Kuss, but is still on the verge of overall victory. Fifth place was enough for the 29-year-old Dane on the 151 kilometre long 19th stage to Piani di Pezzè. Behind his victorious US team-mate Kuss, Canadian Derek Gee took second place ahead of Italian Giulio Ciccone on the very tough 4,800 metre climb.

In the overall standings, Vingegaard is still 4:03 minutes ahead of the Austrian Felix Gall. Former Giro winner Jai Hindley from Australia is third, 5:04 minutes behind.

Kiss makes the trilogy perfect

The professional cyclists had to tackle no fewer than six climbs, including the 2,233 metre high Passo Giao, the highest point of the 109th Tour of Italy. A large breakaway group dominated the race for a long time, but Vingegaard's Visma team never let them get much more than three minutes away.

Kuss, who was one of the breakaway riders, finally took the initiative on the final climb. Although this was only five kilometres long, it had an average gradient of 9.7 per cent. In the end, Kuss saved 13 seconds from Gee at the finish and thus also won a Giro stage after stage wins at the Tour de France and the Vuelta a España.

Three-time stage winner drops out

One of the protagonists of the Giro ended the tour in the early stages of the stage. The Ecuadorian Jhonatan Narváez abandoned the race. The three-time stage winner of this year's Giro had had a minor accident on the way to the bus the day before and was therefore in a bad way. Narváez had won stages four, eight and eleven.

The final mountain test is scheduled for Saturday, where Vingegaard should theoretically have no problem winning the overall standings. The first 130 of the 200 kilometres between Gemona del Friuli and the winter sports resort of Piancavallo are largely flat. Then the 14.5 kilometre climb to the finish has to be tackled twice. A total of 3,750 metres in altitude have to be mastered, around 1,000 less than on the queen stage. Traditionally, the leader is no longer attacked on the final stage in Rome.

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