Arndt pulls closer to Giro Donne lead

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Columbia-HTC's Judith Arndt put in a brilliant performance on the sixth stage of the Giro Donne, expertly maneuvering herself into second place overall just 12 seconds behind the new race leader, Claudia Hausler.

Arndt and teammate Mara Abbott went clear with three other riders on the second climb of the 119.3km stage, but left the morning's leader Emma Pooley (Cervelo TestTeam) behind on the descent.

With 40 kilometres still left to go to the finish, and Pooley's teammate Hausler poised to don the maglia rosa from the breakaway, the remaining four put more than five minutes into the peloton.

Arndt took the uphill sprint ahead of Hausler of Germany, with Bigla's Nicole Brandli taking third ahead of Abbott.

The Columbia-HTC women now occupy second and third overall, with Arndt 12 seconds and Abbott 38 seconds behind Hausler's lead with three stages to go.

"It's a close situation overall and anything could happen over the next three days," pointed out Columbia-HTC team director Ronny Lauke. "Two of the upcoming stages are really tough, whilst the third is flatter and shouldn't change much overall. But when the gaps are as small as this you never know."

"Today was a really big step forward for the team," Abbott commented. "The stage win was important because there are time bonuses, but the main objective was to open up a big gap overall and that's what we achieved."

"I finished fourth in the final sprint of four, but I wasn't worried. We'd agreed I'd work harder during the break so Judith could save her energy for the final sprint, and when the three came past me with about 500 metres to go I was happy to see them go!"

"We'd covered the attacks in the first part of the stage, then after the group of five formed Ronny told us to go for it on the descent because Pooley wasn't there. Afterwards it was very hard going, but it was exciting watching the lead gradually go up little by little, from 20 seconds to 25 to four minutes."

With two riders so close to the leader, Abbott says that Columbia-HTC "have two cards to play in the last few stages and that's an advantage."

"My form's getting stronger day by day, so that's good, too. It's certainly a great race!"