Contador wins again on Mirador del Sol

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Alberto Contador (Saxo Bank) claimed another mountain top stage victory on the Mirador del Sol, while American Levi Leipheimer (Omega Pharma-Quick Step) held fast to the race lead after five stages of the Tour de San Luis.

Contador, Leipheimer and local favourite Daniel Diaz (San Luis Somos Todos) entered the final kilometre together and a roar erupted from the crowd lining the windswept, switchbacked ascent as none other than Diaz made a powerful surge at 700 metres to go.

Urged on by the partisan supporters Diaz momentarily looked like he would pull off a major victory, but Contador steadily clawed his way back, with Leipheimer matching him pedal stroke for pedal stroke.

With one final surge at 150 metres to go, in the last steep ramp to the vista overlooking San Luis's popular tourist destination of Merlo, Contador dispatched of his rivals to win by two seconds over Diaz and five seconds on Leipheimer.

"I'm very happy," said Contador. "If at the beginning of the race you would have told me that I will win two stages I would not have believed."

For Leipheimer, the grueling 6.7km climb to the finish was all about preserving the leader's jersey, beginning with an initial tactical decision when Contador detonated the lead group with four kilometres to go.

"We took the first kilometres of the climb very fast and then Alberto attacked very early," said Leipheimer. "I decided to wait with [Vincenzo] Nibali because he had more teammates, but I had to come back to Alberto by myself.

"When I reached Alberto there were two riders with me, Diaz and [Jose] Serpa, and for me it is most important to keep the jersey so I made tempo."

Serpa was dropped inside of two kilometres remaining, leaving Contador, Leipheimer and Diaz to vie for stage honours.

Leipheimer admitted he was too tired to contest for the stage victory, instead opting in favour of neutralising Contador for as long as possible, and he was gracious in his comments about the Spaniard.

"It's nice to see Alberto win because obviously he's a big champion and has won many races and I think that's very good for the Tour de San Luis," said Leipheimer. "My objective and the objective of Omega Pharma-Quick Step is to keep the jersey so this is my goal, not the stage win. My team did a lot of work and I can't risk anything so I can only think about the jersey."

While Leipheimer remains in the leader's jersey, there was a shuffling of his closest general classification rivals. Contador moved from fourth to second, 46 seconds back, while Diaz jumped from sixth to third at 1:31.

Schumacher dropped from second to fourth, five seconds behind Diaz and Nibali fell from third to fifth at 1:50.

A perfect day for a long break

Action in the 160.6km stage from La Toma to Mirador del Sol kicked off with an early attack by Claudio Claveles (San Luis Somos Todos), Mauro Richeze (Argentina), Eloy Ruiz (Andalucia) and Juan Esteban Arango (Colombia).

They soon pushed their lead out to 2:30 when two more riders, Emmanuel Guevara (San Luis Sodos Todos) and Gabriel Juarez (Argentina), decided they, too, wanted to be up the road and proceeded to chase the four leaders.

Claveles was dropped from the lead group, but sat up and waited for the juncture by Guevara and Juarez.

With strong crosswind buffeting the riders, the peloton was content for the moment to grant the escapees some breathing room.

Richeze, Ruiz and Arango soon found themselves with an advantage of 9:40, with the three chasers closing at 1:05.

After the two groups combined into a six-man break their lead had been pushed out to a whopping 13 minutes.

Stiff winds and an amped up tempo in the peloton would eat into the break's advantage and after 100km had been covered the lead had been reduced to six minutes.

The day's second intermediate sprint proved fruitful for Guevara, whose third place finish behind Arango and Richeze would move him into the sprint classification lead.

With less than 25km to go the break still held a four minute lead, but that rapidly plummeted. Their escape came to a conclusion with 13km remaining with the finishing ascent of Mirador del Sol looming in the distance.

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