Visma-Lease a Bike’s bad luck and injuries at the Giro d’Italia has continued, with sprinter Olav Kooij forced to pull out of the Giro d’Italia due to a fever, two days after taking his first Grand Tour stage win in Naples.
Kooij is the third rider on the Dutch team to abandon the 2024 Giro after Robert Gesink and Christophe Laporte were forced to leave the race due to injuries sustained in crashes on stage 1 and stage 5 respectively.
Ethan Vernon (Israel-Premier Tech) and Max Kanter (Astana Qazaqstan) also abandoned the Giro before stage 10, while Alexander Krieger (Tudor Pro Cycling Team) crashed out on stage 9 suffering multiple rib fractures and a fractured pelvis. He remains in hospital in Naples.
Vernon was struggling to recover despite being on antibiotics and the German has an “acute respiratory viral infection with fever”.
These latest abandons leaves 159 riders to start stage 10 of the Giro from Pompei to Cusano Mutri (Bocca della Selva).
Kooij and Visma-Lease a Bike celebrated on Sunday night but then he became ill during Monday’s rest day.
“This Giro d’Italia sweeps us through a range of emotions. Olav Kooij has developed a fever during the rest day. He is unable to continue,” read a statement from the team on social media.
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“Get well soon, Grand Tour stage-winner.”
Kooij took his stunning win on stage 9 of the Giro in a breathtaking finish ahead of Jonathan Milan (Lidl-Trek) and Juan Sebastian Molano (UAE Team Emirates) but will play no further part in the five possible remaining sprint stages.
This leaves Visma, who won the Giro in 2023 through Primož Roglič, with only five riders starting the second week: Cian Uijdtebroeks, Jan Tratnik, Attila Valter, Edoardo Affini and Tim van Dijke.
Their ambitions will now likely focus fully on protecting Uijtdebroeks’ lead in the best young rider’s white jersey classification and his place in the top 5 on GC as he sits 4:02 behind race leader Tadej Pogačar, while the likes of Tratnik and Valter could now be granted more freedom in breakaways.
The young Dutch sprinter’s exit marks a continuation of bad luck for top side Visma-Lease a Bike with many of their ambitions for 2024 being derailed by illness or, more notably, through injury, with superstars Wout van Aert and Jonas Vingegaard ruled out for much of the season with fractures.
What was an incredibly stacked sprint field has not only reduced in size but also strength with riders such as fellow stage winner Tim Merlier (Soudal-QuickStep) struggling with injuries after a crash in the time trial.
With the sprint field now hampered, more teams could be interested in the breakaway after they were largely well-controlled in the first week and so limit the sprinter’s hopes this week on flat stages up the Adriatic coast.
Stage 4 winner and maglia ciclamino wearer Milan will likely be looked at as the favourite for the sprints with his Lidl-Trek team expected to take control.
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