Michael Valgren: I'm back but I’m just grateful I can still be a cyclist

“Easy question,” Michael Valgren says when asked whether he can not only return to his level of old but be even better than before. “I think I am already. The numbers show that. Yeah, I’m back."

The EF Education-EasyPost rider was speaking to GCN ahead of stage 4 of the Giro d’Italia, insisting he was capable of winning a stage at this, his first, Giro d’Italia. A day and a half later, he crossed the line in Lucca having come agonisingly close, but having backed up his first point.

The context to all this is that Valgren’s career nearly came to an end in 2022, when he crashed over a guardrail and down a big drop on a descent during the Route d’Occitanie that June. He broke his pelvis, fractured his hip, and the initial recovery proceeded so slowly he began to think he might never race his bike again.

By April 2023, after extensive physiotherapy and even psychological rehab using virtual reality, he was back in the bunch, but no longer a WorldTour rider, dropping down to EF Education-EasyPost’s development squad to proceed along a steady road to recovery. He rejoined the WorldTour ranks at the start of this season and has amassed 32 days of solid racing before coming to the Giro, which he hopes will make him stronger still.

“After a Grand Tour you always just get such a big engine from it,” the Dane explained. “I was already last year back at a really good level, then I just hoped I’d put on like a new layer, and I’ve done that. Now after this I think I’ll be stepping up a bit more, so it’s really important.

“But I feel good already and I’m here to fight for a stage win. Anything else would be… I don’t want to say stupid, but there’d be no reason to be here.”

Read more: Giro d'Italia stage 5: Benjamin Thomas takes a dramatic win from the breakaway

Valgren was true to his word, and came within a bike length of a first victory since 2021, as he arrived in Lucca as part of a four-man breakaway that foiled the big sprint teams. He put up a strong fight against Cofidis’ Benjamin Thomas but the Frenchman had the edge and Valgren had to settle for second. Not that he was overly disappointed.

“It’s the Giro, right… it means a lot,” he said, his voice starting to crack with emotion. “A few years ago I wasn’t sure if I’d have a contract….”

© Getty Images

Valgren (left) misses out to Benjamin Thomas in the sprint from the break on stage 5 of the Giro d'Italia

Valgren slipped into the breakaway, which was in fact the second of the day, with 77km remaining after Alpecin-Deceuninck had neutralised the first on the Passo del Bracco and then taken their foot off the gas on the way towards the intermediate sprint.

“Benjamin came to me and said ‘hey Michael, we are six or seven guys who want to attack after the sprint, are you ready?’ I said ‘no, because I crashed yesterday and I have pain in my knee’, but I then thought ‘why not try?’."

That move only counted four riders in the end, or “three-and-a-half”, if you accept Valgren’s sardonic take on Polti-Kometa’s Andrea Pietrobon skipping turns and then attacking late on. But they survived by a slender 11 seconds to sprint it out between them.

“You always think the peloton will take 10 seconds per kilometre, more or less, but we kept working well together and in our favour it was kind of downhill and you can only go a certain speed with the same gearing. Chapeau to the other guys for working well together.

“The Polti guy was taking short turns and not super strong, then he came with a late attack, which kind messed up the collaboration. I had to go for a really long sprint, hoping I could do a Magnus Cort Nielsen sprint, but I have a bit more to learn. In the end Benjamin is a really good rider. It’s a shame but I’m happy to be in the mix again.”

Valgren noted he had “10% extra in the legs” given these were the roads he once called him as an adopted native of Tuscany during the early years of his career. Perhaps this result will give the 32-year-old confidence worth another 10%.

On this evidence, that victory will come - not that it’s the be-all and end-all.

“I’m just grateful I can still be a cyclist,” Valgren concluded.

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