Sunday 15 May 2016 19:27, UK
Gianluca Brambilla clung on to the overall lead of the Giro d’Italia on stage nine’s individual time trial as just 26 seconds separated all of the favourites for victory.
Brambilla (Etixx - Quick-Step) posted the 17th-fastest time on a rolling and rain-soaked 40.5km course in Chianti, 2min 5sec down on winner Primoz Roglic (LottoNL-Jumbo), which was enough to remain top of the general classification by a solitary second from team-mate Bob Jungels, who was sixth on the day.
Tom Dumoulin (Giant-Alpecin) was the fastest of the pink jersey hopefuls, beating Vincenzo Nibali (Astana) by 15 seconds, Mikel Landa (Team Sky) by 22 seconds, Steven Kruijswijk (LottoNL-Jumbo) by 25 seconds and Alejandro Valverde (Movistar) by 26 seconds.
The result leaves Nibali 53 seconds adrift of Brambilla in fifth overall, Valverde 55 seconds down in sixth, Dumoulin 58 seconds back in seventh and Landa 1min 18sec adrift in eighth.
Dumoulin's result was a major disappointment given that he is a time trial specialist and had been hoping to make far more substantial gains on his rivals.
But the biggest loser of the day was Ilnur Zakarin (Katusha), who plummeted from second to 11th overall after a catastrophic time trial in which he crashed twice on the drenched roads and also had to stop for a bike change due to a mechanical problem.
Dumoulin said: "I didn't want to take any risks in the downhill parts and then you've got no chance of having a good result."
The biggest winner was Landa, who had been expected to lose ground on the likes of Nibali and Valverde but instead produced a superb performance to remain neck and neck with both on the day and within touching distance of them overall.
Landa told teamsky.com: "I concentrated well during the stage and I think that led to a really good performance. The bike, the tyres - everything came together and it gave me a lot of confidence to be safe out there in difficult conditions. As the stage went on my condition got better and better."
Roglic, meanwhile, claimed the most prestigious win of his career by beating Matthias Brandle (IAM Cycling) into second place by 10 seconds.
The former ski jumper said: "I'm really happy with my performance. I should be jumping and smiling, but it's crazy. It's hard to realise. When I quit ski jumping and started cycling, I was dreaming of becoming the best, but I didn't expect to succeed so quickly. The longest individual time trial I did before today was 10km long."
The Giro pauses for its second rest day on Monday but resumes with a mountainous 219km 10th stage on Tuesday, ending with a summit finish in Sestola. Find out more about the stage in our race guide.
Stage nine result
1 Primoz Roglic (Slo) LottoNL-Jumbo, 51:45
2 Matthias Brandle (Aut) IAM Cycling, +10sec
3 Vegard Stake Laengen (Nor) IAM Cycling, +17
4 Fabian Cancellara (Sui) Trek-Segafredo, +28
5 Anton Vorobyev (Rus) Katusha, +30
Selected others
6 Bob Jungels (Lux) Etixx - Quick-Step, +45
15 Tom Dumoulin (Ned) Giant-Alpecin, +1:58
17 Gianluca Brambilla (Ita) Etixx - Quick-Step, +2:05
19 Vincenzo Nibali (Ita) Astana, +2:13
20 Mikel Landa (Esp) Team Sky, +2:20
22 Alejandro Valverde (Esp) Movistar, +2:24
General classification
1 Gianluca Brambilla (Ita) Etixx - Quick-Step, 34:33:04
2 Bob Jungels (Lux) Etixx - Quick-Step, +1sec
3 Andrey Amador (Cos) Movistar, +32
4 Steven Kruijswijk (Ned) LottoNL-Jumbo, +51
5 Vincenzo Nibali (Ita) Astana, +53
6 Alejandro Valverde (Esp) Movistar, +55
7 Tom Dumoulin (Ned) Giant-Alpecin, +58
8 Mikel Landa (Esp) Team Sky, +1:18
9 Rafal Majka (Pol) Tinkoff, +1:45
10 Jakob Fuglsang (Den) Astana, +1:51
