Arnaud Demare (Groupama-FDJ), a three-time stage winner of the 2020 Giro d'Italia, claims that one of his key rivals, Peter Sagan (Bora-Hansgrohe), may have lost high-end speed as he focused on the classics He states.

Sagan has finished second three times in this year's Giro d'Italia, starting with the uphill finish of stage 2 in Agrigento, followed by stage 4 in Villa Franca Tirrena and stage 7 in Brindisi.

Meanwhile, De Mare continued to dominate the sprints of the 2020 Giro, taking his third win in four days on Friday.

Asked why he doesn't think Sagan can surpass him in the Italian Grand Tour, at least for now, the French national champion cited the Slovakian's focus on the classics as the reason.

"Maybe he has lost some of his explosiveness and speed by choosing the classics," De Mare speculated, "and that's probably the same mistake I made a year or two ago.

De Mare's strategy certainly paid off in the Giro d'Italia, as on Friday he won three stages in a nine-day "week" for the first time in a decade.

Riders with two wins in the same period before the first rest day were Pascal Ackermann (2019), Elia Viviani (2018), Fernando Gaviria (2017), Marcel Kittel (2016, 2014) and Andrei Greipel (2016), Diego Ulissi (2014), Mark Cavendish (2013, 2012).

DeMare is now one better than all of them and may add another win to his collection on Saturday before Monday's rest day.

Rather than attribute his success to himself, DeMare paid tribute to his teammates' contributions in winning the seventh stage.

"Jacopo [Guarnieri] sorted things out when the UAE tried to pass us. In the last kilometer (Ramon) Sinkeldam had a mechanical problem and we had to change tactics in the last 200 meters, but (Miles) Scottson took over his role perfectly. Cono' (Ignatius Konovalovas) had the strength to help me in the last kilometer.

"On top of that, it was a really hard sprint, elbow to elbow all the way to the line. Overall it was a tough day."

Demare went so far as to interrupt his race interpretation to talk about how well supported Grupama-FDJ had been, proving that the team had played an important role.

"Simon Guiliemi is in his first year as a racer and is doing a great job. But I also have a lot of experienced riders. Jacopo, Ramon, and Cono ....... These riders have been with me for 3 or 4 years now and they all have good brains. They know how hard it is to win in a sprint. And the best thing about us is that we are humble, we don't take things for granted."

The sprint itself was not entirely without controversy, given that Demare shifted his line slightly in the final dash and "closed the door" on Sagan as the Slovakian came up from the right.

However, there were no objections to the commissaires and no penalties for dangerous behavior, such as Sagan received during a stage of this summer's Tour de France.

On this day, Demare was the focus of questions about the cancellation of the "Queen of the Classics" due to her 6th and 12th place finishes in Paris-Roubaix.

"It's very sad for cycling and for the history of cycling. I think this is the first time since World War II that a race has been cancelled. It's a strange year.

"I've gotten through a lot of races in cycling just fine, but this is a setback," DeMare said.

In any case, for now, De Mare is focusing all his energy on the Giro d'Italia sprint. He said that the security he has gained from his previous victories has created a kind of domino effect, making it easier to win as the Giro progresses and less prone to overreacting to challenges.

Citing Friday's sprint as an example, he said, "When the Quick Step rider started his sprint, I let him go a bit and waited for the right moment to accelerate. And yesterday [stage 6], when I was feeling tired on the climb just before the final sprint, I gave myself time to recover. It's good to win one sprint so I can take more risks.

But no matter which path DeMare chose to take for victory, no matter how much he and his team gambled, at least this week, the outcome ended exactly the same.