Race favourite Tadej Pogacar was on Thursday hailed as "unbeatable" even as he revealed he contracted Covid just 10 days ago.

Winner of the 2020 and 2021 Tour de France, the Slovenian won the Giro d'Italia last month and is hoping to become the first rider since Marco Pantani in 1998 – the year Pogacar was born – to win the rare combination of a Tour-Giro double.

"The Giro-Tour double is difficult to achieve. It's a big challenge but I'm ready to take it on," the Team UAE rider said.

The challenge will be made even tougher by the presence in the peloton of two-time defending champion Jonas Vingegaard, the Dane who pushed him into the runner-up spot in the past two editions, as well as two other leading contenders, Primoz Roglic and Remco Evenepoel.

Belgian rider Evenepoel deemed Pogacar "unbeatable" if he remains "safe and sound" but that dose of Covid may just have sapped some of the strength from his legs.

"I fell ill 10 days ago," Pogacar told a press conference in Florence.

"I had Covid and there was a little question mark but I am fully recovered. It wasn't so bad. It was just a cold that passed quite quickly."

Visma rider Vingegaard, 27, was not reading too much into the news of Pogacar's Covid.

"It depends if it was a bad dose," said the Dane. "I don't know how much it will take out of him, but it doesn't sound perfect." (AFP)