After two sprint stages the time trialists will fight for the leader shirt now. Within the favourites already the top GC riders Gesink, Tenorio and Pluchkin. Also Uran, Lecuisinier and Nibali within the top chrono men. Oz`s Durbridge and Ford within the best pure time trialists.
Durbridge on the road as 3rd rider. So far he struggled in the TTs but obviously takes first at the moment. Campenaerts as other early starter though is not far off. Good time by the Belgium or average time by the Aussie?
Meier with a huge ride going into the lead until the half time. Though he is losing ground then. +28s at the 3rd split and another 21s until the finish. 2nd for him.
Fraile and Grabovski in the meantime with 4th and 8th for now while Kudus is a good example of a stage racer with only decent time trial skills. The Eritrean is losing more than 4min today!
Dempster starts very fast and takes the lead. Though then being +1s at the next and already 26s and 3rd later. In the finish it`s the 2nd but 42s behind Durbridge.
Alarcon as former winner also losing more than 5min! Quite a lot to get back in the mountains.
Izagirre, Haig and Nibali later with decent times. But far from the best. Between 1 and 2min behind Durbridge as top10 riders.
After Van den Broeck and Velits will lose couple minutes, Úran then with yet another solid ride. Top5 for now at all splits. About 1min down on Durbridge.
Tenorio is the big Spanish hope for a home win. Though since his Santander glory couple seasons back, he struggled to repeat such palmares similar to his former team mate Madrazo.
Today an okay ride but far from the expectations. Outside top10 and more than a minute behind. 18s to Uran.
Lecuisinier with a good ride about 1'30 behind as one of the better GC riders. Machado more than 2min back but still decent.
Then Gesink as one of the best allrounders. The Dutch takes 1st at all splits and this continues into the finish different to other riders. He beats Durbridge`s time from several hours back by 36s.
This is 1'31 to Uran, 1'49 to Tenorio, 2'10 to Lecuisinier and so on.
Ford today can`t beat his team mate. But still a good ride. He goes into 4th just behind Gesink, Durbridge and Dempster. So unlucky for Oz that they won`t get todays stage win.
Pluchkin as World Champion in this discipline is not todays top favourite but still showed in past how to win against the clock.
Today though his time is below his average. Already out of top10 at the splits and also just 13th in the finish losing 2'16 on Gesink!
So far from ideal but at least not losing a lot on any other as he is just around all other good time trialist GC riders and gaining on many.
