World champion Tom Dumoulin took his second time trial victory in the Tour de France after stage 13 in 2016 to retain his second place overall behind Geraint Thomas who finished third in the Basque country while Chris Froome came second and deprived Primoz Roglic of the third position on GC.
145 riders were expected to start the only time trial of the 105th Tour de France. The first man on the road was Lawson Craddock (EF) who has been last on GC since his heavy crash on stage 1. Successively, Jay Thompson (Dimension Data), Amund Groendahl Jansen (LottoNL-Jumbo) and Marco Marcato (UAE Team Emirates) set new best times on the line until Michael Hepburn (Mitchelton-Scott) clocked in 42’15’’, which appeared as an excellent performance compared to the predictions of the experts. The Australian remained on the hot seat for one hour and fourty-eight minutes. Marc Soler (Movistar) was first to better his time, albeit by only five hundredth of a second. Soren Kragh (Sunweb) was next to set a significant time at the average speed of 44.6km/h. The Dane didn’t last long in the lead as Michal Kwiatkowski (Sky) rode one second faster than him.
Chris Froome back on the podium
In the fight for the top 10 positions on GC, Ilnur Zakarin moved to ninth and Nairo Quintana to tenth. Designated the super combative of the 2018 Tour de France, Dan Martin remained eighth. Romain Bardet rode 1’16’’ faster than Mikel Landa to pass him in sixth position. Steven Kruijswijk comfortably retained his first top 5 but no LottoNL-Jumbo rider would make the top 3. Chris Froome quickly indicated that he had the resources to climb on the final podium of the Tour de France for the sixth time after finishing second in 2012 and winning in 2013, 2015, 2016 and 2017. He was faster than Tom Dumoulin and Primoz Roglic at the two check points: by 2’’ on both occasions over the Dutchman, by 30’’ and 49’’ over the Slovenian.
Geraint Thomas always in control
Geraint Thomas led the race at the two check points: 14 and 13 seconds ahead of Froome. But he didn’t go as fast as the other favourites in the third part of the course at the difference of Dumoulin who powered to victory at the end. The Dutchman won over Froome by one second. Thomas comfortably secured his lead overall on the eve of the conclusive stage on the Champs-Elysées.
