Van der Poel and Pogačar force Ganna into energy-saving mode at Tirreno on the road to the Poggio

Ganna had already started his season at the Volta ao Algarve, where he also stamped his authority on the individual time trial. As usual, he then skipped Opening Weekend. In fact, the only time he rode Omloop Het Nieuwsblad and Kuurne-Brussels-Kuurne was back in 2018, when both races ended in a DNF for him.

This year, INEOS Grenadiers did not ride Kuurne-Brussels-Kuurne anyway, which allowed Ganna to prepare fully for the next major target on his calendar: Tirreno-Adriatico. On Monday he lined up for the race for the tenth time in his career, and once again he took the opening stage. “My fifth win in the Tirreno. I didn’t even feel amazing today, but I kept going and I was pushed to the limit from the car,” Ganna said afterwards.

At INEOS they will have been pleased to see Ganna included in this year’s Tirreno line-up, because that was not completely set in stone. Before the race, he admitted that he had to speak with the team in order to ride it. Afterwards, he added in an English-language interview: “Tomorrow’s finish will be interesting. We’ll try to make the race hard, we’re in really good shape.”

In his first eight appearances at Tirreno-Adriatico, the man from Verbania had never finished higher than 70th overall, but in 2025 he suddenly ended the race in second place overall. Last year Ganna crushed the opening time trial by 22 seconds over Ayuso and immediately gave himself a huge advantage in a field that did not include Tadej Pogačar or Jonas Vingegaard.

In the stages that followed, he kept hanging on brilliantly, which allowed him to start the mountain stage to Frontignano in the blue leader’s jersey. There, Ganna climbed in classic time-trial style and still limited his losses to just 50 seconds to Ayuso at the finish. Thanks to bonus seconds, he then moved back ahead of compatriot Antonio Tiberi on the final day to secure second overall.

So should we view Ganna as a real general classification threat again this year, especially in a route that on paper does not contain a truly decisive summit finish? Not immediately. He had already made that clear on Sunday. “Let me first say that I always love racing Tirreno-Adriatico, but first and foremost the opening time trial in Lido di Camaiore was my goal,” the Italian explained. By Monday evening, that objective had already been ticked off.

That mindset is largely linked to his real spring ambition: Milan-San Remo, followed by Paris-Roubaix. “In the rest of Tirreno-Adriatico, I also have to be aware that I need to save energy for Milan-San Remo, because that race is made harder every year by Mathieu van der Poel and Tadej Pogačar,” said Ganna, who last year was the only rider able to stay with those two for deep into the finale.

It is a lesson Van der Poel and Wout van Aert had already learned in 2021: go too deep in Tirreno, and it becomes difficult to hold peak form through the rest of the spring. Ganna felt that himself in 2025. “In the end I noticed that in Paris-Roubaix I no longer had the right legs and I was a bit drained, so that is why I am a little less advanced now than I was in 2025.”