The perfect match between bike and rider led defending Dutch time trial champion to extend his national title today, as Tom Dumoulin (NED) charged to victory at the Dutch national time trial championships on his Giant Trinity Advanced SL.

Dumoulin set out to regain his title in Montferland today with a 50 kilometre course that suited his strengths well. After a strong start Dumoulin rebounded from a six second deficit that was clocked at the first intermediate checkpoint. By the next clock-stop, he had taken back seven seconds to put him into the lead by one second. It came down to a showdown between two which saw Dumoulin continue with his famous time trialling power to ride to the Dutch time trial victory for the third time in his professional career. He stopped the clock at 59 minutes and seven seconds, securing the title by 24 seconds. 

"I'm really happy to take the win once again," said Dumoulin after the race. "The parcours suited me well and although the heat made things quite challenging, I managed to cope with the conditions well. Dealing with the mental and physical aspects of the past few weeks have gone pretty well and have been much easier than I had anticipated. It's great to be able to wear the jersey for another year."

Team Sunweb trainer Adriaan Helmantel added: "We knew that the circumstances today would be quite difficult after Tom suffered fatigue following an intense racing period. He had a good few days of recovery over the past week to ensure that he was feeling fresh for today. The team did a great job in executing the protocols to perfection so that all Tom had to focus on was what he does best. We knew that it would be a mental battle above everything but he was really motivated beforehand to keep the jersey. He had a really controlled start and went at his own pace despite initially being down a few seconds. With each checkpoint his lead increased and in the end he won by 24 seconds, it's a really strong ride from him and a great performance."