Riccitello sneers at Vingegaard and co after losing time in white jersey battle: "Has everyone else already won enough?"

Through the first two weeks of the Vuelta, Pellizzari and Riccitello had kept each other almost perfectly in balance. After fifteen days of racing, the duo went into the final rest day separated by just 32 seconds in both the general classification and the young rider classification. On stage 17, the 21-year-old Pellizzari doubled that gap to 1 minute and 8 seconds.

It was a heavy setback for Riccitello, who had answered Pellizzari’s first attack on the final climb sharply, but hesitated when the Italian tried again. He was sitting at the back of the GC group, but the other favorites let the rider in fifth overall go. Didn’t the explosive Tom Pidcock want to chase? No, as the Brit explained afterward.

That left Riccitello with the task of bringing Pellizzari back... and by then it was really too late. When the small climber moved to the front of the group, the audacious leader already had a 20-second gap. In the strong headwind, and with the help of Red Bull teammate Jai Hindley, that margin only grew. Hindley kept the pace high, while Riccitello briefly asked him to take turns.

“In the end, it’s my fault for not following Pellizzari immediately,” Riccitello admitted to Eurosport, first pointing the finger at himself. But still full of emotion, he immediately added: “I expected the others to also want to ride for the stage win, so I was disappointed they didn’t want to help. They had little to lose, but that’s cycling. It is what it is.”

“I think with the wind we were all pretty evenly matched,” he continued. “But no one wanted to do anything. Jai least of all, once Giulio was up the road. Maybe the others have already won too much? I’m frustrated, but I can only really blame myself for not following him.”

After seventeen stages, Riccitello sits seventh in the GC, but the gap to Pellizzari in fifth is still just a little over one minute.