Arguably the biggest favourite to win the Eneco Tour, Tom Dumoulin was hit by a major setback when he punctured at the worst possible moment in today's stage of the Eneco Tour. Due to a fierce pursuit by almost the entire Giant-Shimano team, he rejoined the bunch but with the addition of bonus seconds, he lost 24 seconds to defending champion Zdenek Stybar.

A puncture at the most inopportune moment of the second stage of the Eneco Tour for Tom Dumoulin left him and the team with a hard chase to try to get back up to the front group. Dumoulin flatted with just under 20km to race just as the pace was ramped up in pursuit of the day’s breakaway.

After hard work by him and his teammates, Dumoulin took off in solo pursuit of the peloton in the closing kilometres, making it back to the main group just before the finish to limit his loses ahead of tomorrow’s stage three individual time trial.

The stage was animated by a break of three riders and behind the chase was variable with different teams contributing but with 30km to race the gap was still over three minutes and the escapees were looking more and more menacing.

Just as the speed at the front of the bunch was ramped up in a technical section being blasted by crosswinds, Dumoulin punctured. Immediately six teammates stopped and waited with him before launching their pursuit but once back up to speed the gap was already near a minute.

Crashes in the peloton meant that the team came back up to the rear of the convoy and Dumoulin was able to move up together with other riders in the cars before then making one last big effort to close the gap to the peloton in the final five kilometres.

The front of the race had split through a mixture of crosswinds and crashes and a small group held a small advantage over the peloton that contained both Dumoulin and Luka Mezgec at the finish. Mezgec had stayed in the front group following Dumoulin's puncture to contest the finish but he was also held up behind a crash and finished outside of the top ten placings.

Last year’s overall winner Zdenek Stybar (Omega Pharma – Quickstep) took the stage and with it the overall heading into tomorrow’s individual time trial.

Team Giant-Shimano coach Rudi Kemna said after the hectic stage: “Some days you have an easy stage, some you don’t and today was a really big job. It was real bad luck to puncture when Tom did. The team immediately waited for him so there were six guys, but they were fighting against the peloton who was really driving it.

“They did a good job in limiting the time gap and then with the crashes at the front of the race they were able to catch the convoy and from there Tom could make up some ground in the cars. He still had a big job to do in bridging back to the peloton but we saw again today that he is in good shape.

“Luka was held up behind a crash in the final kilometres and ended up in the second group as well. Tom was strong today but you also need luck in a race like this – when you work hard in a good way luck will also come.”

Team captain Roy Curvers added: “Everything was pretty nice and controlled until the final 30km where everyone started to get a bit nervous ahead of the crosswinds which we knew were coming. I made the decision to stop with five guys [when Tom punctured] as at that moment the front of the race was splitting in echelons and this made the chase back on even harder to get around these groups.

“It really was the worst moment to puncture, and all we could do was give everything to get him back up there. Luckily we made it back to the convoy and from here Tom went on alone and made it back to the bunch but it’s disappointing to lose seconds in the overall in this way.

“The Eneco Tour is always a game of seconds and maybe we will regret this lost time later on. But we had our bad luck today and possibly in the coming days this will change and we will have our good luck and find ourselves in a better position.”