Stage 4

The road

At the start

Gilbert in red, a wall in Jaén

Philippe Gilbert took the jersey up the ramp into Málaga and leads Joaquim Rodríguez by fourteen seconds, with Nibali at 28 and Igor Antón at 35. Today runs 180 kilometres to Valdepeñas de Jaén, over a second-category climb inside the final ten kilometres and then up a finishing wall steep enough that the sprinters have already given up on it. Thirty seconds at the top should be enough to win.

How it was won

1. 1165 km to go

   Four go, and get seven minutes

   Bonnafond, Carrasco, Cataldo and Roels form the day's move sixteen kilometres in and are given all the rope they want. Omega Pharma-Lotto settle in front of the peloton for Gilbert and stay there all afternoon.

2. 240 km to go

   Katusha join the work

   With less than forty kilometres left Katusha come to the front alongside Omega Pharma-Lotto. They have worked out that the late climb and then the wall to the line will be too much for Gilbert and exactly right for Joaquim Rodríguez.

3. 38 km to go

   The last climb splits it, and splits it again

   The Alto de Valdepeñas de Jaén crests less than eight kilometres from home and cuts the race to pieces — not once but several times. Twenty-three riders come off the top together: Gilbert, Fränk Schleck, Menchov, Antón, Nibali, Rodríguez. Carlos Sastre is not among them, and nobody stays to help him.

4. 41 km to go

   Twenty-three per cent

   The last kilometre into Valdepeñas is a Spanish Mur de Huy, walled in by crowds and touching twenty-three per cent. Halfway up it Igor Antón stands on a small gear and simply goes, and the gap is open before anyone has decided who should close it.

5. 5At the line

   Antón hangs on

   He fades in sight of the line and holds it anyway, from Vincenzo Nibali and Peter Velits, with Rodríguez and Gilbert just behind. Gilbert keeps the red jersey, and has to dig a great deal deeper for it than he did yesterday.

The result