Annemiek van Vleuten retains world time trial title as dominant Dutch claim clean sweep in Innsbruck  

The Dutch team laid down a huge marker at the Road World Championships on Wednesday after Annemiek van Vleuten, Anna van der Breggen and Ellen van Dijk filled all three spots on the podium for the women's time trial in Innsbruck.

As reigning world champion, Van Vleuten was the last rider down the starting ramp and did not have to wait long – 22 mins 25 secs, to be precise – to discover she would soon be adding a second world title to her growing palmarès. After setting the fastest time of the day at the intermediate split – 19 secs quicker than anybody else – Van Vleuten pressed on through the final 10.1km of the 27.7km course before increasing her lead further. By the time the 35-year-old reached the finishing line, her advantage over Van der Breggen was 29 secs.

Only Van der Breggen came to within a minute of Van Vleuten after finishing 29 secs adrift of her team-mate, while bronze medal winner Van Dijk was 1 min 25 secs off the pace.

With one of the strongest teams in Austria – Tom Dumoulin will be confident of winning Wednesday's time trial, their women will start with one of the strongest teams in Saturday's road race and the men's road team will be hopeful going into Sunday's brutal road race – the Dutch will take great strength from Wednesday's clean sweep.