Exactly a week after losing the overall lead of the Vuelta a Espana to Fabio Aru (Astana) in the mountains of Andorra, a stunning time trial performance in Burgos has netted Tom Dumoulin (Giant-Alpecin) the top spot on general classification once again.
However, Dumoulin's stage win over Polish national time trial champion Maciej Bodnar (Tinkoff-Saxo) by 64 seconds and a surprisingly strong Alejandro Valverde (Movistar) in third did not see the Dutchman distance Aru as much as he would have liked. The Italian rode the time trial of his life to finish in 10th place on the stage, maintain his second place overall and remains at a scant three seconds on the general classification.
Joaquim Rodriguez (Katusha), ousted from his fleeting grip on the red jersey and who sank to third overall, had predicted before Burgos that "whoever leads the race after the time trial is almost certain to win."
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Given how tight the general classification struggle is still proving to be between Dumoulin and Aru, with Rodriguez, Rafal Majka (Tinkoff-Saxo) and the Movistar duo of Alejandro Valverde and Nairo Quintana all there or thereabouts in the overall, holding the lead all the way to Madrid may not be as straightforward as Dumoulin would have liked.
Whatever the opposition can achieve between here and Sunday cannot take away from the merits of Dumoulin's time trial ride. He did not seem to let the pressure of hugely raised expectations affect his performance in one of the most important time trials of his career to date. Rather, a faultless race agains the clock without incidents or punctures saw the Dutch star take the fastest provisional check point after 13 kilometres by 11 seconds on Nelson Oliveira (Lampre-Merida). From then on as Dumoulin continued to blast around the rolling course, the only question was how much time he would finally take on the opposition.
Describing the time trial, Dumoulin said, "I was mentally in a good place, this morning I did a second recon of the the course and I asked my sports director to note down every little detail I needed to know to ensure I produced the best performance. I was very focussed and had really good legs. That's what made the difference today."
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