Jai Hindley is ready to seal Australian cycling's impressive week in two of Europe's iconic early-season week-long tours by finishing on the podium in Italy's Tirreno-Adriatico race.
While national road race champ Luke Plapp was finally relegated from the top three in the other big race, Paris-Nice, on Saturday after his brilliant but exhausting breakthrough week in France, BORA-hansgrohe's Hindley demonstrated his Grand Tour-winning quality in the Apennines.
Going on the attack in the penultimate stage on Saturday (Sunday AEDT), Perth's 2022 Giro d'Italia winner Hindley tried his luck several times at breaking Tour de France champion Jonas Vingegaard on the slopes of Monte Petrano with 6.5km to go.
But it was to no avail as the Dane counter-attacked and breezed up the mountain to a second consecutive stage victory, distancing his nearest pursuers, Juan Ayuso (UAE Team Emirates) and Hindley, with another imperious display.
Vingegaard is now 1min 24sec clear of Ayuso and 1:52 ahead of Hindley, and it's highly unlikely the Australian could find half a minute on the final stage, which may well end in a bunch sprint, to finish second.
Still, even third place in such a prestigious tour would represent Hindley's best overall finish in a WorldTour race since his landmark Giro triumph.
His Perth colleague Ben O'Connor (Decathlon AG2R La Mondiale) also continued his fine early-season form following his near-miss for victory at the UAE Tour and is fifth overall, 2:24 down.
Meanwhile in Paris-Nice, there's still everything to play for in Sunday's demanding final stage featuring six tough climbs.
However, Plapp's hopes of a podium place look to have been finally extinguished after a spectacular week in which he had the "privilege" of wearing the leader's yellow jersey for two days.
On Saturday, the 23-year-old hung on gamely again on the slopes of La Madone d'Utelle in the Alpes Martime, but ended up traipsing home 10th behind stage winner Aleksandr Vlasov (BORA-hansgrohe) to drop from third to fifth overall, 47 seconds down on race leader Brandon McNulty (UAE Team Emirates).
However, the race is still wide open, with only four seconds separating McNulty from his fellow American Matteo Jorgenson (Team Visma/Lease a Bike).
Looming ominously in fifth place, 2022 world champ Remco Evenepoel is just 36 seconds off the pace.
