The Giro d'Italia peloton may be sleeping in Hungary tonight, but the first ascent of Mount Etna on Tuesday is looming ever larger in the peloton's imagination. Jai Hindley (Bora-Hansgrohe) is hoping not to repeat history when he summits Mount Etna in the Giro in 2020, the lowest result in a highly successful Grand Tour.

Hindley finished the Giro d'Italia on the podium, taking a stage win and a pink spell. But two years ago, during his first week in Etna, the 26-year-old Hindley told Cyclingnews, "I was in a bad situation.

"I had stomach cramps and suffered a lot. Fortunately, I haven't had that problem since, and I'm actually looking forward to it this time."

"I wasn't in great shape at the 2020 Games, but the final three weeks are always dramatic and things can turn around. I feel like the time [lost] is pretty big, but we can turn it around," he recalled.

While Hindley waits for his chance, Bora Hansgrohe's teammates have been outstanding. Leonard Kemna showed sustained acceleration on the climb to Visegrad late in the first stage and set the provisional best time in Saturday's Giro time trial. Wilco Kelderman also placed fifth over a shorter distance on Friday and finished an impressive seventh in the time trial.

All good news for Beulah Hansgrohe, but on the other hand, Emanuel Buchmann lost nearly a minute in the Budapest TT. This was not due to poor form, however, as evidenced by Buchmann's top-20 finish on Friday. Buchmann crashed on a technical corner of the course, and although he was able to finish the race, he paid a high price in terms of time.

Overall, Hindley said, "The team is doing a good job and morale is high.

"I was personally quite happy with my TT. It could have gone a little better, it could have gone worse. But either way, it's not the end of the world," said Hindley, who lost 34 seconds to Simon Yates (Bike Exchange-Jayco) in the time trial stage.

"I lost a little time in the uphill finish before that [Friday], but that's nothing to stress about," Hindley said. He was four seconds behind Richard Kalapas (Ineos Grenadiers), but was in the same group as most of the overall contenders.

"A punchy finish like that is probably not my forte," Hindley said.

Regarding his opponents in general, Hindley claims, "Obviously Simon Yates is doing very well, but the level of the GC riders is very high this year."

"It was a strange time trial. Riders who are not normally good at time trials were very successful, and maybe they were more suited to GC riders than to specialists."

Hindley also noted that "the time trials were very good, but the riders were not very good at time trials.

Hindley himself had a small celebration at the team hotel away from the race, as Thursday was his birthday.

"I had a really good feeling with everyone on the team.