Nico Denz causes a sensation at the Giro d’Italia. The noble helper has already won two stages. Rolf Aldag feels reminded of star Mathieu van der Poel after Saturday’s coup.
Late at night, Nico Denz gathered the team crew in the hotel car park for a small winner’s party with a glass of sparkling wine.
“It feels kind of unreal. I don’t understand what’s happening right now. It must be a dream,” said Denz after winning his second stage win at the 106th Giro d’Italia in just three days.
Nico who? His name is at best known to cycling connoisseurs. Before the start of the Giro, the 29-year-old had just three wins in ten professional years. At the Bora-hansgrohe racing team, he has the role of the classic noble helper for the captains around the German hopeful Lennard Kämna. Get bottles, close holes that keep stars out of the wind. And suddenly Denz himself is on the big podium at the second largest tour in the world.
His second stage win was downright a masterpiece. Single-handedly, Denz had caught up a 14-second deficit to a top trio and then also won the sprint. “Close the hole, start a sprint, extend the sprint, run a sprint and then win. That reminds me a bit of Mathieu van der Poel at the Amstel Gold Race (note: in 2019). Where you say that’s not really possible,” enthused His sporting director Rolf Aldag at Eurosport and sports director Jens Zemke added: “He’s in the form of his life right now.”
It’s just enough for the stage win
Denz had made it unnecessarily exciting again. One meter before the finish line in Cassano Magnago, the business administration student already raised his arms, while the Canadian Derek Gee came dangerously close with a tiger leap. Memories of Erik Zabel’s faux pas at the spring classic Milan-Sanremo 2004 were awakened, but it should be enough – by a few centimetres.
Denz can hardly be disturbed anyway. That’s how he’s always handled his career, which has been rather unusual. After graduating from high school, Denz went to France, joined the youth team at AG2R, and learned the language and culture there. And had to struggle through in a team that has produced quite big names like the former tour runner-up Romain Bardet. Denz only switched to the German-Dutch DSM team in 2021 before moving on to Bora at the beginning of the year.
There he actually wanted to recommend himself for the first Tour de France participation. In the end it was the Giro again – for the sixth time. In hindsight, it couldn’t have gone better. “After the victory you could see that the pressure on the team had dropped. The Giro has already been won for us with two stages,” said the father of two after the 40th German Giro stage victory. But Denz isn’t done yet: “It can go on like this for another week. All good things come in threes!”
Source: Stern
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