Geraint Thomas rode an aggressive Giro d'Italia stage 14 time trial, taking risks on some corners of the 31.2km Lake Garda course but his adrenaline-fuelled performance paid off and cancelled the disappointment of last week's test against the clock in Perugia.
Thomas finished fourth on the stage, 1:14 down on his Ineos Grenadiers teammate Filippo Ganna, who won the stage. Maglia rosa Tadej Pogačar (UAE Team Emirates) was second on the stage 45 seconds up on Thomas, while and another Ineos rider, Thymen Aresnsman, was third at 1:06.
American rider Magnus Sheffield looked to be racing to a top-three placing but slid out at speed on a late corner and ended up 12th. As a result of a successful day out, Ineos Grenadiers took control of the team classification from Decathlon AG2R La Mondiale.
When Thomas stopped to talk about his ride in the shadows of the trees overlooking Lake Garda, a mobile phone displayed the new overall classification and confirmed that he also jumped past Dani Martínez (Bora-Hansgrohe) to second overall and now leads the Colombian by 15 seconds.
He now lies at 3:41 down on the dominant Pogačar ahead of Sunday's queen stage through the Alps to Livigno, but he's the first of the mere mortals.
"It's pretty good… It's decent so far," Thomas said of his time trial and his performance in the Giro d'Italia after seeing he had moved above Martínez.
"So just a big, big week to come now."
Thomas was determined to ride a very different race to stage 7 in Perugia, where he finished 10th, losing 1:59 to Pogačar. As a result, he took risks on the largely flat but twisting loop from Castiglione delle Stiviere to Desenzano del Garda.
"I wanted to be more aggressive and just attacked it," he said while admitting he almost overdid it early in the stage.
"I attacked it a bit too much, because in the left-hander after about a kilometre and a half, I almost overshot it. That got the adrenaline going at least.
"There was another corner where I almost overshot it as well. And another I came in a bit too hot. It was a bit fast, I wasn't necessarily in control all the time, which isn't a good thing…"
Thomas admitted his performance wasn't perfect but he went deep, suffered and hung on in the final third of the stage.
"Just going off how I felt it's pretty good. I just felt I lacked a bit coming into 10km to go," he admitted.
"It was the fastest part but I felt like I kind of lost it a little there and was just trying to bring it home. But it was hard. I didn't feel like I quite held on but it was certainly a lot better than the last one."
Thomas took pride in moving past Martínez. He admitted that Pogačar is on another level but seemed upbeat as the high mountains begin on Sunday.
"It's just Tadej, definitely it's Tadej. We all know that, but you've just gotta keep trying, that's all we can do," he said. "Now we'll see how next week goes."
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