Tour de France 2018: Time will be the final trial for Tom Dumoulin
Tom Dumoulin remains the one realistic threat to Geraint Thomas’s bid to wear the yellow jersey in Paris and has experience of Grand Tour success, having won last year’s Giro d’Italia.
But the Dutchman ended an agonising 46 seconds behind Chris Froome in his Giro defence, bidding to go one better at the Tour de France only to — for now at least — be outdone by another Team Sky rider.
For Thomas and the Tour in 2018, read Dumoulin and the Giro in 2017, a race he entered but never truly believed he could win it. Looking back, Dumoulin said: “I didn’t even dare to dream about winning a Grand Tour.
"I always thought my climbing ability wasn’t good enough to compete with the best but I surprised myself by climbing so well during those three weeks.
"I’ve learned to push myself even harder than I thought I ever could.”
Today’s stage gives the climbers one last chance to show their worth, but Thomas, with the support of his Sky team, has so far proved rock solid.
Tomorrow sees the individual time trial and Dumoulin, as world champion in that discipline, is expected to cut into Thomas’s lead. But the question is: by just how much?
