Giro d’Italia leader Tom Dumoulin (Team Sunweb) survived what could have been a tricky eleventh stage yesterday without any losing time to his GC rivals.
His team-mates Chad Haga, Sindre Skjøstad Lunke, Simon Geschke, Phil Bauhaus, Tom Stamsnijder and Georg Preidler controlled affairs in the peloton while Laurens Ten Dam maintained a presence for the team in the break of the day.
Dumoulin rolled across the line with the general classification contenders 1’37” behind stage winner Omar Fraile (Team Dimension Data for Qhubeka) and as a result, wears the Maglia Rosa for again tomorrow. He maintained his lead of 2’23” over second-placed rider Nairo Quintana (Movistar Team).
After stage 11 Dumoulin said: “We weren’t thinking about the riders up the road in the break today, we just focused on what we were doing and went at our own pace. I knew if we carried on doing that all day that we would be fine. It was also in other team’s benefit to help bring the gap down, which of course was good for us.
“I took it easy on the first part of the last descent so I could get back to Laurens [Ten Dam] and he could pull so I wasn’t too stressed about the attacks that came then. The guys did a great job, it was amazing team work from everybody and I’m really happy.”
Team Sunweb coach Aike Visbeek said: “We knew today would be really difficult for the GC but we stayed calm and stuck to the plan. There were some good numbers and names in the first group but we had Laurens up there. The plan was for Laurens to wait on the last climb for Tom, so he always had someone with him. The plan worked out perfectly, we were calm at the beginning where it was pretty chaotic and the guys kept control of the gap all day. I am really proud of how the team road and we are all really happy to keep the Maglia Rosa for another day.”
