A lot of pre-race attention was focussed on whether riders would change bikes for the final climb or not and the first rider onto the course, Kazakhstan’s Alexey Lutsenko, made a hash of his attempt to do exactly that.

Lutsenko struggled to clip into his road bike, and required several pushes outside of the red carpet that was designated for bike swaps.

His problems were not reflective of those who followed, however, with riders evenly split between sticking with their TT bike and swapping.

Great Britain’s Tao Geoghegan Hart, racing in place of national time trial champion Steve Cummings – who dropped out having focussed on, and then not been selected for, the road race – was hampered in his effort by a crash, and a tight chest, and finished off the pace.

In his place, the early pace-setters included Laurens de Plus (Belgium) in 47.16, while Jan Tratnik (Slovenia) put 51 seconds into him.

An indicator of Dumoulin’s likely tactics came when Wilco Kelderman (Team Sunweb) swapped bikes and promptly set a new fastest time of 46.15, while Froome’s trade team-mates Vasil Kiryienka (Belarus) and Gianni Moscon (Italy) stuck with their Pinarello Bolides and set superb times of 46.09.75 and 46.10.49 respectively.

Both Team Sky men were within a second of Nelson Oliveira (Portugal), who set the new clubhouse lead with a time of 46.09.52.

Froome opted to stick with the same bike, while Dumoulin – perhaps influenced by the weather – followed suit with very little distance between the two on the road.

One rider who did still go for a bike change was Primoz Roglic (Slovenia), which he negotiated safely, and he clearly benefited from it as he wiped 30 seconds off Oliveira’s mark.

Froome lost time to the Slovenian on the ascent, with Dumoulin on his tail having almost wiped out the 90-second difference between their start times.

And now sooner had the Brit crossed the finishing line, than Dumoulin stormed through to claim his first ever rainbow jersey.

With only Tony Martin left on the course, Froome could still have lost bronze, having started the final climb a second in arrears to the German, but ultimately – as expected – the defending champion faded on the ascent.

UCI Road World Championships – men’s time trial – result

1) Tom Dumoulin – Netherlands – 44.41.00
2) Primoz Roglic – Slovenia +57.59
3) Chris Froome – Great Britain +1.21.25
4) Nelson Oliveira – Portugal +1.28.52
5) Vasil Kiryienka – Belarus +1.28.75
6) Gianni Moscon – Italy +1.29.49
7) Wilco Kelderman – Netherlands +1.34.33
8) Rohan Dennis – Australia +1.37.39
9) Tony Martin – Germany +1.39.88
10) Jan Tratnik – Slovenia +1.43.45