Vine blooms amid Plapp's gloom in Aussie Giro drama
Australian cyclist Jay Vine has once again demonstrated his considerable courage by overcoming a knee injury to finish a superb third in the second-stage time trial at the Giro d'Italia.
But while Vine rebounded magnificently from a first-stage spill which he had feared might prevent him from lining up in Albania on Saturday, his compatriot Luke Plapp, the national time trial champ who had been flying through the streets of Tirana, had his chances flattened by his own crash.
Vine delivered a superb ride on the 13.7km circuit around the capital 24 hours after he had taken a heavy fall and finished only three seconds behind British stage winner Josh Tarling and two seconds adrift of race favourite Primoz Roglic, who ended the day in the leader's pink jersey.
The 2023 Australian time trial champ Vine had his right knee heavily strapped, which made observers wonder whether, if he had been fully firing, the in-form UAE Team Emirates rider might even have taken the stage victory himself.
On Friday, Vine, who's making a tremendous 2025 comeback after suffering what he had feared might be a career-ending crash with cracked vertebrae at last year's Tour of the Basque Country, was unable to avoid an accident in which Mikel Landa's Giro ended by injury.
Saying his thoughts had all been with the Spaniard, who also endured a fractured vertebra, Vine admitted before the second stage: "Honestly, I wasn't even sure I'd be able to start today, but the knee's feeling much better and I'll be back on the start line."
This time the misfortune was all with Jayco AlUla's Plapp, the three-time Australian TT champ who slid off his bike earlier in the day as he rounded a tight corner and, after remounting on a new bike, could only limp home as the slowest finisher among the 182 riders some four minutes adrift.
No-one could match the 16min 7sec effort of the 21-year-old British champ Tarling, who's the youngest ever Giro time trial winner.
But 2023 Giro champ Roglic (Red Bull-Bora-hansgrohe) demonstrated he's in the mood to regain his title as he powered home fractionally short of his target.
Michael Storer, Australia's best hope of challenging Roglic in the overall standings, also had a super day, finishing 19th on the stage in 16:35. Among the GC contenders, the Tudor Pro rider, the recent Tour of the Alps victor, is ninth overall, 27 seconds behind the Slovenian leader.
Denmark's Mads Pedersen (Lidl-Trek), the opening-stage winner on Friday, could only finish 12 seconds behind in seventh, having to relinquish the leader's jersey to Roglic by a mere second.
But he may have a good chance to regain it on Sunday in the last of the Albanian stages in a 160km ride that starts and finishes in Vlore.
Australia's 2022 Giro champion Jai Hindley was 35th quickest on the day but lies 16th overall, 39 seconds behind.
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