Jai Hindley (Bora-hansgrohe) has dropped Richard Carapaz (Ineos Grenadiers) on the final climb of the Giro d'Italia, Passo Fedaia, and gained 1:28 on him.
With just tomorrow's TT to come in Verona, Hindley now looks like he has enough time over Carapaz to win the race, two years after losing the maglia rosa to Tao Geoghegan Hart (Ineos Grenadiers) on the last stage TT.
Australian Hindley had team mate Lennard Kämna - who dropped back from the early breakaway - as a crucial asset today. Hindley attacked from the select group on the final climb just as Kämna came into sight dropping back.
That Hindley attack was covered by Carapaz, with Mikel Landa (Bahrain Victorious) and Hugh Carthy (EF Education-EasyPost) unable to follow. Kämna then kept riding hard on the front with just Hindley and Carapaz on his wheel.
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And with about 4km to go to the finish line at the top of the climb, Carapaz was dropped by the two Bora-hansgrohe riders. Once he cracked, he faltered badly and Hindley took advantage.
In seconds, Hindley moved around his team mate and went for broke; climbing his way solo all the way to the finish as Carapaz lost time having shown the first weakness since the race began three weeks ago.
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The time gaps today meant Hindley took the race lead from Carapaz - by 1:25 - ahead of tomorrow's final TT tomorrow in Verona which will conclude Giro 2022.
Today's stage 20 took the riders 168km from Belluno to Marmolada Passo Fedaia and saw an early breakaway go clear, with the strongest of those riders winning the day.
From that escape group, Alessandro Covi (UAE Team Emirates) attacked and won the stage solo in what was a fantastic performance by the 23-year-old Italian, who beat Ireland's Mark Downey for a stage win at Tour de l'Avenir in 2018.
Covi won today by 32 seconds from Domen Novak (Bahrain-Victorious) with stage 15 winner Giulio Ciccone (Trek-Segafredo) 3rd at 37 seconds, Antonio Pedrero (Movistar) 4th at 1:36 and Thymen Arensman (Team DSM) 5th at 1:50.
And after those five breakaway survivors came the very impressive Hindley; 6th place on the stage at 2:30 but with the most important time gap behind him, as 1:28 elapsed before Carapaz crossed the line.
The Ecuadorian cracked quite badly as some of the riders he had dropped earlier on the climb, as he attempted to follow Kämna and Hindley, rode back up to him and distanced him; namely Landa and Carthy.
While Hindley was 6th on the stage Carapaz was 11th; even losing 39 seconds to Carthy and Landa. The result today means Hindley now leads Carapaz by 1:25 in the GC, with just tomorrow's 17.4km TT in Verona to come.
After the top two, Landa remains in 3rd place overall but has now decreased the advantage of Carapaz to 26 seconds with all to play for in the final TT tomorrow.
