Giro d'Italia 2018 standings: Leader Simon Yates under pressure after Esteban Chaves woe

The Lancashire-born racer came through the 2018 Giro’s longest stage, a mammoth 240 kilometre slog through Italy’s rugged central region, with his lead intact and even gained a three second bonus mid-race.

But his Mitchelton-Scott team-mate Chaves, previously second overall, suffered a massive loss of power on a tough early climb and finished more than 25 minutes down.

Yates, 25, said afterwards that Chaves nightmare stage represented a big setback for him, too.

“I think it becomes harder for me, because previously when we were both on the final climbs, we had two cards to play, it was much more difficult for our rivals to chase us both,” Yates argued.

“But now it’s only me and we’ll have to adjust our tactics.”

Yates said he was bitterly disappointed for Chaves, his co-leader for the Giro d’Italia in the Mitchelton-Scott squad, and second overall in the race in 2016.

“We had a good rest day [on Monday], we were relaxed and from what I saw he was his normal self.” Yates said. “But today he didn’t have enough power in the legs.”

Yates said the 244 kilometre stage, featuring over 3,000 metres of vertical climbing, had had a brutally fast beginning, with constant attacks.

“It was one of the most aggressive starts I’ve seen for a while, especially for such a long day’s racing.”

“It was really ferocious. We just never stopped, it was a very difficult day for everybody.”

The only compensation of Chaves disastrous day, Yates said, was that the Colombian could now focus on helping the Briton win the Giro.

“For sure he’ll be a strong help for me in the climbs, so maybe you can look at it two ways.”

Yates’ one consolation yesterday was that he now holds the British record for days spent leading Giro d’Italia, cycling’s second hardest stage race after the Tour de France.

The racer from Bury, Lancs. has topped the overall classification for five days, one more than previous record-holder Mark Cavendish.

Meanwhile Chris Froome moved up to tenth overall after Chaves dramatic time loss.

“It was a very hard stage, everybody was feeling fresh and there was a lot of action at the start of the day” Froome said afterwards. “But I’m pleased that I was in the front group and didn’t lose time.”

Froome is lying two and half minutes behind Yates, after an exceptionally difficult first week for the Briton.

The Sky rider has crashed twice since the race began on May 4th, and he struggled badly on the race’s main climb on Sunday, the 25 kilometre Gran Sasso.

But the four-times Tour winner was adamant on Monday’s rest day that he would fight on regardless, saying “I still want to do the best I can do, if it’s [for] 20th place, 2nd or 1st place - I’m here to race.”

Froome and the rest of the field will face another difficult test of their climbing ability on Wednesday on the short but punishingly steep final uphill finish in Osimo.