As Expected, Dutchman Tom Dumoulin Pulled Off a Double in the Time Trial: He Won the Stage and Pulled On the Red Jersey — Already for the Third Time.
The Dutchman rode a brilliant race from the start and built a decisive advantage already on the first section. His aerodynamic position and even pedaling were truly textbook over the whole distance, which naturally brought him the result he wanted. Notably, Tom beat even the specialists by more than a minute, confirming once again his class in the individual time trial.
Tom Dumoulin on the course of the Vuelta time trial Photo: IB/LB/RB/Cor Vos
Among the GC contenders, the best results came from Movistar’s Alejandro Valverde (+1:08) and Nairo Quintana (+1:33), as we had written, but they had lost a lot before, and with this result they only moved closer to the podium. Of the current leaders, only Italy’s Fabio Aru fought to the end: the Astana rider lost significant time to Tom on the stage (+1:53), but kept his chances of winning the race because he managed to minimize his deficit overall.
Fabio Aru managed to minimize his losses in the second half of the course Photo: Tim De Waele/TDWsport.com
So, as we predicted, the leading six took shape, and they are the ones who will fight for the podium places on the final stages.
- Tom Dumoulin (Netherlands) Giant-Alpecin 72:24:07
- Fabio Aru (Italy) Astana +0:03
- Joaquim Rodríguez (Spain) Katusha +1:15
- Rafał Majka (Poland) Tinkoff-Saxo +2:22
- Nairo Quintana (Colombia) Movistar +2:53
- Alejandro Valverde (Spain) Movistar +3:15
Three hard stages lie ahead, on which the climbers will try again, so that they can sip the champagne on the final, friendly stage!
Featured image: Tim De Waele/TDWsport.com
Inside post thumbnail image: Cor Vos/La Vuelta/Team Giant-Alpecin
Translated from Georgian with the assistance of Claude (Anthropic), reviewed by the Velorbola editors.
In history, only three riders have won all five Monuments: [...]
April 15, 2019
