The same but different. Simon Yates is once again back at the Giro d’Italia as a contender, a role the 32-year-old climber has had on so many occasions in the past: But this time, rather than leading for Jayco-AIUIa, Yates finds himself in the unfamiliar position of heading the Visma-Lease a Bike squad’s GC Giro bid after switching squads over the winter.
Rather than being the main focus of attention, the Briton is part of a team that also includes Belgian allrounder Wout van Aert and sprinter Olav Kooij. That’s not to mention two riders with their own, very successful, Giro d’Italia careers, former top-five finisher and longstanding 2016 race leader Stephen Kruijswijk and Wilco Kelderman, a podium finisher in 2020.
Yates has his own impressive palmares in the Italian Grand Tour too, a race which he rode five times on the trot between 2018 and 2022 and where he has taken six stages to date. He came closest to winning it in 2018, only to be poleaxed by illness almost within sight of the finish of Rome, on the Colle dell’Finestre, but his best result so far is third overall in 2022, his most recent participation.
Currently lying 13th overall at 45 seconds, after a time trial where he shed 33 seconds on Primoz Roglič (Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe), Yates said he has had something of an uneven build-up to the Giro d’Italia, his first Grand Tour with his new team, in large part due to a traffic accident and illness. But at the same time, his off-season had gone well, and his final steps towards the race had been much more in line with what he had expected, too.
“I had a really good offseason, I didn’t have any problems,” Yates told a small group of reporters at the stage 3 start. “Unfortunately, in Tenerife for the first altitude camp and I was hit by a car, and that delayed my preparation there.”
“Then after the camp only a week before Tirreno, I was also sick so that was not the perfect end to final preparations, either.
“Still I went ok at Tirreno, I was getting better at Catalunya and hopefully here I can take another step, too.”
Comfortably up in the main group when it dropped some outside favourites on the hilly finale on stage 1, Yates took another positive lesson away from the time trial on stage 2 as well.
“The time trial went ok,” he commented. “I would say it was not a great course for me, being a smaller guy, but I was there or thereabouts compared to some of the GC guys. Of course, some of them were in front of me [on the stage classification], but I did a good job.”
A solid start to the Giro is anything but unexpected in Yates’ case, given this is his sixth participation and 17th Grand Tour start. But he recognised that he was in a very different position regarding his team after so many years at Jayco, with his first comment when asked to compare both squads being – ‘Where do I start?’
“Obviously, it’s very different to what I was used to at Jayco, both have their pros and their cons. In Jayco, I had a lot more responsibility to prepare myself, whereas here it’s very structured, very organised for everybody. It depends on what you consider the best approach to be, but I’m enjoying myself so far,” Yates explained.
Yates said he found himself in a very similar situation to when he was in races, but off his bike, things had changed notably.
“Is there less pressure? Not really. I wouldn’t say I feel pressure from outside, it’s more pressure I put on myself to perform.”
“What is different is that that I actually have less responsibility around the race, in terms of interviews and media and so on. I’m enjoying that quite thoroughly and hopefully that continues.”
Yet for all Yates has no complaints about spending less time in the limelight, should he start to succeed in the way he has done in the past in the Giro, then inevitably he’ll be back in much greater demand by the race media. Under those circumstances, though, Yates likely won’t be complaining at all.
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