While Jumbo Visma's second sweep of the podium this week was the big story, Simon Yates (BikeExchange-Jayco) has moved into the lead role threatening Paris-Nice supremacy with a fifth place finish in the fourth stage time trial to Montluçon. [Yates is in fourth place overall, 49 seconds behind yellow jersey Wout Van Aert and 39 seconds behind favorite Primoš Roglic.

In fact, Yates set the top time at the midway checkpoint of Wednesday's stage, two seconds ahead of Van Aert.

Three years ago, Yates unexpectedly won the 25km time trial at the Paris-Nice-Barbentin. This time, he was satisfied with his 13.4 km time trial, although he had to settle for fifth place, 11 seconds behind.

"That's how I picked up the pace. The difficult climb was the first one, and it was the first little drag that made the difference," Yates told reporters.

"In the downhill, the bigger guys might have a little bit of an advantage over me because of their weight advantage, but I couldn't make up much ground. From there, I just went full throttle.

"Of course, I'm quite happy with this. It was the best run I've had in a TT in a while.

Yates hopes Wednesday's race will be the start of a return to form against the clock. His last top-10 finish in a time trial came on the first day of the 2019 Giro d'Italia in Bologna, when he finished second ahead of Roglic in the Colle San Luca.

In the previous season, he had two good time trial finishes at the Giro and defended the red jersey in the final week's time trial at the Vuelta a España.

"Sometimes you can be at the bottom with a good time, and sometimes you can be at the top with a bad time. It's all about pacing and keeping a good aero position. It's something a lot of specialists are good at."

"But it's not just a matter of keeping a good pace and keeping a good aero position.

"But after two or three weeks in a Grand Tour, it's different. You can't give the same power because you're not fresh anymore, or at least I can't because I'm tired.

Yates has unfinished business in Paris-Nice, finishing second overall in 2018, but lost the yellow jersey to Marc Soler by four seconds on a breathless final day.

However, his overarching goal for 2022 is the Giro, he explained, and he chose Paris-Nice over Tirreno-Adriatico given the two short rolling time trials in Corsa Rosa.

"That's one of the reasons I wanted to come here instead of Tirreno," Yates said.

"Whereas in Tirreno it was a British '10' style out and back, here it's a bit more of a lumpy time trial, you run 400 watts and you're done. Here you really have to pick up the pace and make decisions in the corners."