Why did Jonas Vingegaard want to lose blue jersey to Diego Pablo Sevilla on Stage 9 of Giro d'Italia 2026?

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In a peculiar game of cat and mouse, race winner Jonas Vingegaard may have had motivation to shed the fabled blue jersey on the second weekend of the Giro d'Italia.

Explained: Vingegaard's 'strange' battle to lose blue

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Though the Dane insisted he was "happy" to ride in the king of the mountains garb ahead of Stage 9, which he won in a dramatic finale, Visma-Lease a Bike suggested they would "prefer" their rider to don the team's skin suit.

But would Vingegaard trade his preferred outfit for a stage win or significant gains on general classification?

That was the question posed in the TNT Sports studio before Sunday's action, which sees a punishing Cat.1 climb up Corno alle Scale.

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With Diego Pablo Sevilla (Polti Visitmalta) sitting just one point behind Vingegaard (61) in the blue jersey classification, presenter Orla Chennaoui summed up the predicament facing the pair.

"Sevilla would love to have that blue jersey, and actually, given the stage we have to come, Jonas would also dearly love to lose the lead on the blue jersey. But it's not as simple as him just giving that up," explained Chennaoui.

The peloton enjoys their second rest day on Monday, but Tuesday will see a flat 42km individual time trial served up, where every second matters.

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TNT Sports expert Robbie McEwen set out the situation, saying: "So Jonas is in the blue jersey, which is from the organisation, so there's no choice about the construction, the fabrics etc.

"They're coming into a time trial where aerodynamics is everything. They've put an enormous amount of work and expense into finding the best aerodynamic package for Jonas Vingegaard.

"They've gone as far as having a Jonas dummy shaped like him in the wind tunnel doing all these sorts of tests. He wants to wear the skin suit from his own team, so now he's stuck in the blue jersey and wants to get rid of it."

Matt Stephens added: "There are significant gains or significant losses, they reckon, because of testing.

"The reason it's such a hot topic of discussion is because there are measurable differences from wearing different sorts of skin suits, and research has strongly suggested or proved now that long sleeves is the way to go as well.

"Skin isn't as aero as fabric with these lines in it that could basically smooth the air flow over the body, and we could be talking 20, 30 seconds over a 40km time trial.

"The thing is, this is a long, flat TT. It's not a mountain climber where aerodynamics don't come into effect; it's significant."

For his part, Spaniard Sevilla would be more than happy to take the maglia azzurra from Vingegaard, whose Stage 7 win at Blockhaus earned him top spot on the classification.

Sevilla said before the race: "I only said he [Vingegaard] looks good with the blue jersey, just joking. Maybe today we have to try something. Maybe the break can arrive, so if I go in the break, I take some points, I will take the jersey again. So we will try."

But with Vingegaard chasing the Triple Crown of all three Grand Tours on Giro debut, it will not be as simple as letting Sevilla race away.

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The Dane needed to make up 3'15" on GC leader Afonso Eulalio before Stage 9 and Sunday's hilly 184km race is the perfect opportunity to pull back the Portuguese youngster.

"It tells us a lot about the sport," said Stephens. "The fact that the teams don't want to be in jerseys. I think it's a little bit strange. I don't think it's overly helpful, to be perfectly honest with you.

"Imagine trying to back off and not be in a prestigious jersey? So there's the counter argument: it's just odd. But also, from a technical perspective, I do get it."

TNT Sports expert Adam Blythe added: "He won't want to give up the stage win. The other day when they rode to Blockhaus, Visma contributed to that win of Jonas.

"Today, they don't need to ride for a stage win. I think they can still take time, which will be the main goal for him. But bringing a breakaway back, I don't think they're going to do it. Just for them, it's a waste of energy and they don't need to do it."

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Visma sports director Marc Reef concurred with Blythe, saying: "Of course you prefer to be in your own jersey because we invested a lot, we spent a lot of time testing all kinds of suits.

"But in the end, you're in the race and it was also possible that he was already in pink, so you just have to take it how it comes and you should also not spend too much energy on that."

What if Vingegaard refused to wear blue?

Vingegaard himself was diplomatic in the face of his conundrum, even if he and his team would prefer to contest the individual TT in their own custom-made suit.

Before Stage 9, the 29-year-old said: "As I said yesterday, it's nice to have the blue jersey. It's nice to have a jersey to ride in and I'm happy for every day I can have a leader's jersey."

However, TNT Sports reporter Jens Voigt suggested that the affected teams could explore other options in order to optimise Tuesday's race.

With Giulio Pellizzari set to be in the young rider's white jersey in lieu of GC leader Eulalio, Voigt noted that Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe might consider taking a fine to keep the Italian in the team's colours.

"Here's some inside info," Voigt said. "We talked about the TT suit of Jonas Vingegaard, that he wants to really desperately use his own TT suit. They spent two months developing it.

"The same goes for the team Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe. They've got the white jersey. They don't really want to use the white jersey skin suit from the organisers.

"So they're looking into different options: get a tailor to the hotel tonight, tomorrow, to really tailor fit that organiser skin suit to their rider; or they're actually looking into how much does it cost to not use that skin suit, use the team skin suit, and just pay the fine for that."

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But McEwen and Stephens were sceptical, arguing the the Giro organisers would come down hard on any team refusing to wear the classification jerseys.

McEwen said: "This is the Giro though. The organiser, I've heard it said before in this situation, they say, 'Wear what you're given or don't line up.'"

Stephens added: "It's an interesting one, because they can take a fine. But knowing the Giro organisers a little bit, you can look at things like legal action and stuff, because the big sponsors of the main jerseys understand the options.

"It'd be a bit of a gamble. You just don't know what you're going to be faced with."

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