Doumoulin needed a lieutenant, no-one from Sunweb so he had to lean on Pinot and Reichenbach, since Lopez and Caparaz where fighting each other. He admitted his mistake too: had he pushed on Solo he might have limited losses, stayed in pink.
He did not admit his mistake, where did you read/see that? Interviewed afterwards, he stood by his decision, and explained he knew he wouldn’t have a chance going mano a mano uphill with Froome so he chose to bring the other guys along.
Yep. Dumoulin even knew the day before exactly when and where they would, and still couldn’t do a thing about it