Froome stamps authority on day of mourning at Tour de France

Tour de France leader Chris Froome was in no mood to celebrate on Friday following the shocking attack in Nice.

For time-trial specialist Dumoulin, stage 13 was his second success of this year’s tour.

The race continues on Friday with the 13th stage – the 103rd edition of La Grande Boucle.

There were no kisses, and the usual podium celebrations.

“I agree that you come to the race, you have a good time, but you don’t need to be running beside the riders, you don’t need to hitting riders, pushing riders”, said Porte, who was being examined for possible injuries.

There was also a moment of silence at the start, several hours’ drive from Nice, and Tour director Christian Prudhomme wore a black armband around his blue shirt.

Security was ramped up on the stage with 600 members of various police forces deployed along the time-trial route to block all access roads leading to it.

Froome led Yates by 47 seconds at the start of yesterday’s time trial.

His time trial may have been one minute three seconds slower than Dumoulin’s superb stage-winning pace, but he was nearly two minutes quicker than Mollema, who is now his closest threat for the overall lead.

Briton Froome was riding to the finish inside the final kilometre with Australian Porte and Mollema of the Netherlands having distanced the rest of the overall contenders when all three crashed into a motorcycle that was brought to a standstill by a wall of fans.

But time gaps and places did not preoccupy most involved with the Tour in light of the circumstances.

Tom Dumoulin won but couldn’t even force himself to break into a smile, while Chris Froome, who extended his overall lead, was visibly emotional and refused to answer “sporting” questions.

The Colombian threatened to snatch yellow late in last year’s Tour and Froome is prepared for more of the same.

Thousands of fans lined the roads at the starting line in the town of Bourg-Saint-Andeol, France, amid reinforced security a day after a driver of a large truck plowed into a crowd for a Bastille Day fireworks display in the Riviera city of Nice, killing at least 84 people.

Earlier, near the podium where the minute’s silence was held, Froome told reporters: “It was nice of the other riders to respect that minute of silence”. My thoughts are with all the families affected by the attack. “I suffered more on the flat because of the wind. To see the promenade with those horrific images puts things into perspective in the Tour de France”.

He lost approximately one-and-a-half minutes as a result of the commotion and slid down to sixth in the general classification before common sense prevailed and the race jury revised the results to keep him in front.

“It’s pretty clear today”, said Froome, who lives near Nice in Monaco, “everyone’s thoughts are with those affected down in Nice, and it’s hard for us to be talking about the race”.

Dumoulin had no such problems, however, and was evidently on a great day as he passed his two-minute man, Amael Moinard, in super-quick time. “We have to go on”.

Saturday’s Stage 14 of the Tour, features a 208.5 km (130 mile) run from Montelimar to Villars-Les-Dombes Parc des Oiseaux.