Former time trial world champion Tom Dumoulin said Jonas Vingegaard's run to win stage 16 of the Tour de France was "the best time trial ever."

The former Dutch professional time trial specialist and 2017 Giro d'Italia winner made the comment after Vingegaard's dominant 22.4km time trial to Combrue on Tuesday night.

Vingegaard was 1:38 ahead of yellow jersey rival Tadej Pogachar and 2:51 ahead of Jumbo-Visma teammate and third-place finisher Wout Van Aert, almost securing his second Tour de France title.

He now leads the race by 1:48 over Pogachar, and former teammate Dumoulin said "nobody could have imagined" such a dominant ride.

"I witnessed the greatest time trial in the history of cycling," Dumoulin said on Sporza's evening television program, Vive le Vélo. First of all, Vingegaard is pulling away from the rest of the field. But I also saw his downhill and flat part, and that was real time trial porn. It was great to watch

"He was taking a lot of time on the uphills. But he was great on the descents and cornering.

"The time trial, of course, is a completely different discipline from what we've seen in the last two weeks. Often crazy things happen there. But no one could have imagined that it would be a hammer blow of over a minute and a half. Neither Vingegaard nor Pogachar. Everyone was surprised."

Dumoulin praised Vingegaard for his second career time trial victory. At one point he even doubted his power meter.

He rode his time trial bike for the entire time trial, including the 9.4% Côte de Domancy and the climb to the line. Pogachar, on the other hand, switched to a road bike for the climb. His UAE Team Emirates defended this decision, but Dumoulin was critical of both the switch and Pogachar's performance.

"I didn't think he had a great run," Dumoulin said. 'It wasn't like La Planche des Belles Filles in 2020. There was a lot of pedaling then. There was a lot of pedaling then.

"I also questioned the choice to change bikes. It would disrupt my rhythm. You might have been stressed for kilometers before, and so would the mechanics...If it was a serious climb like La Planche des Belles Filles, of course you could do it. But today, for the riders who switched, it turned out that it wasn't the right choice."

"I don't know what motivated him to switch bikes. Maybe he had a physical problem that made him uncomfortable on the time trial bike.

Dumoulin, who raced for Jumbo Visma from 2020 until his retirement last season, praised his former team as "the best team in the world," but said of Pogachar's UAE Team Emirates, "It's a little less than perfect."

However, he insisted that despite potential differences in organization, the time trial results were primarily due to Vingegaard's strength.

"Right now, Jumbo Visma is the best team in the world in everything. Vingegaard and VanArt's bikes are made without paint to save 150 grams of weight."

"In the UAE, I feel like I'm just a little bit short of that perfection. But to be clear, not a minute and a half difference. But to be clear, it's not a minute and a half. That was mainly due to Vingegaard's legs."