Tom Dumoulin raced to victory in the closing time trial of the Tour de Suisse, taking his second win of the week, after his victory in the prologue. 

The closing stage of the Tour de Suisse was an individual time trial of 38.4km around the city of Bern. Dumoulin was the fastest, with a time of 48’36” and an average pace of almost 47.5km/h on the rolling parcours.

His strong performance today lifted him to third in the general classification of the Tour de Suisse. Dumoulin was 18″ faster than runner-up and overall winner of the Tour de Suisse, Simon Spilak (Katusha Team).

Also strong performances by Georg Preidler with a 19th in the time trial, and Warren Barguil, taking 12th in the final GC.

After his time trial Dumoulin said: “I am really happy with this win. The course went up and down constantly, with a lot of technical sections, which always makes it difficult to find a good rhythm, but that suited me well today.

“Underway I heard the intermediates of the GC competitors and I had mixed feelings because I had hoped for the GC win as well, but the others were very fast and I was strong enough to beat them in the time trial. My form is excellent at the moment, and compared to last year I have taken another step forward in my development, also as a leader within the team.

“I never focused on the result; instead I focused on my effort in the time trial. In the end I got the best result possible, and I don’t think I lost it anywhere. The goal was to deliver two good time trials, and I did this by winning them both.”

Coach Addy Engels added: “It was an exciting day, and we can be very satisfied with the outcome. Tom did everything well and rode an outstanding time trial, but his direct GC competitors were fast as well.

“In the back of our mind we had hoped for the overall win, which is normal when you are in the position Tom was in today. For now we are very happy, as it turned out to be the best possible result. His time trial could not have been better, and it’s an honest result.

“Third in the GC in a WorldTour stage race like the Tour de Suisse is very good.”