The Dutchman, who was 14 seconds ahead after his success the day before, only conceded three on Yates and even beat specialist Tom Dumoulin, third, five seconds from this time of 9.2 km from postcard, between the emblematic monuments of the Hungarian capital.

MVDP had promised to "try" to keep the "maglia rosa" the day before, it was very close to winning.

The missing three seconds being those lost on the flat part before the final climb of the Buda hill (1.3 km at 4.9% average gradient) where he came up against Yates' reference time (9 min 50 sec , average of 46.6 km/h).

Although he explained that he had only tried his time trial bike once this season, there was little doubt about his ability to keep the leader's jersey on Saturday: he had not been clumsy in the Tour de France in July by resisting Tadej Pogagar to keep the yellow jersey in the fifth stage in Laval.

The success of Simon Yates, the fifth in a stage of the Giro, was less expected in front of specialists like Tom Dumoulin or Joao Almeida (eleventh at 18 seconds).

But the Briton, who will turn 30 on August 7, had already shown himself to his advantage in the short time trial (13 km) of Paris Nice in March (fifth) when he had dropped only eleven seconds to the vice-world champion in the specialty Wout van Aert.

He even imposed himself in the exercise, precisely in the "race to the sun" in 2019.

Dutch rider Mathieu van der Poel (Alpecin-Fenix) still wears the pink jersey at the end of the second stage of the Tour of Italy, time trial in the streets of Budapest disputed on Saturday May 7, 2022 Luca Bettini AFP

Among the favourites, the Colombian Miguel Angel Lopez and the Spaniard Mikel Landa are those who suffered the most substantial disbursements (respectively 59th at 42 sec and 30th at 33 sec) in front of the belvedere of the Fishermen's Bastion offering a panorama of Instagram snapshot on Pest and the famous Gothic Parliament of Hungary.

The big favorite Richard Carapaz (19th at 28 sec), like the Frenchman Romain Bardet (17th at 24 sec), limited the damage in this exercise where they did not shine.

© 2022 AFP