During Friday's Giro d'Italia stage, Tom Dumoulin (Jumbo-Visma) joked with compatriot Mathieu Van der Poel (Alpecin-Phoenix) that he only needed one day for the pink jersey, and that he wanted to go for it himself on Saturday.

But even though Van der Poel won the opening stage on Friday to take the lead, 24 hours later, Dumoulin failed to live up to his good-humored expectations in the time trial on Saturday, losing by an uncomfortably slim margin. Instead, he lost third place to former TT world champion Simon Yates (Bike Exchange-Jayco) and Van der Pol.

After powering across the TT finish line at Budapest Castle to take the provisional overall lead, which was quickly overturned by both Yates and van der Pol, Dumoulin, pursued by a small army of Dutch journalists, turned from victory to defeat when the wheels finally stopped He did not give any pussyfooting about the fact that he had.

"I gave it everything. Probably just one or two corners, and I would have liked to have more power on the last climb," Dumoulin said.

Alarm bells were beginning to ring at the mid-stage checkpoint, as Yates was already one second ahead of Dumoulin on the technical and tricky early flat sections of the TT. Alex Dowsett (Israel-Premier Tech) told Cycling News before the stage that "it's not a course that favors the specialists," and he was right.

"But Yates made a big difference on the climb, where I cracked," Dumoulin noted.

"But obviously I wasn't strong enough."

Dumoulin, who won the Giro's opening time trial in Jerusalem in 2018, went into the Giro expecting a strong start. "It was disappointing," he said, "because I was trying to win and I didn't succeed.

Having missed the mark by a small margin, Dumoulin's second chance to show his time trial form will of course come in Verona on the final day.

But it will be his climbing ability that will be tested the hardest in these two races, and it won't be long before the first test comes in Etna on Tuesday.