Team Sky and Chris Froome negotiated a tricky finale to stage two at the Ruta del Sol to maintain a strong GC foothold.

Froome was paced over the final climb by his team-mates and jumped up to third place overall in Lucena after a technical run-in on dusty roads.

Pete Kennaugh was full of riding and also rose one position to fifth on the leaderboard, the Manxman covering a number of dangerous moves in the closing stages.

One such burst came from race leader Alberto Contador as the Spaniard (Tinkoff-Saxo) stretched his legs briefly in the final kilometre. Finishing comfortably in the peloton meant Contador maintained his eight-second advantage over rival Froome.

Another consistent showing saw Team Sky place four riders inside the top 10 on GC. Kanstantsin Siutsou jumped up two places into ninth, with Mikel Nieve now occupying 10th.

A late third-category climb ensured it was a reduced peloton that sprinted it out, with Juan Jose Lobato timing his winning move to perfection on the uphill ramp.

The Movistar rider kicked early and opened up a gap which was too large for John Degenkolb (Giant-Alpecin) to shut down at the finish.

Froome was a vigilant 12th across the line after 194.7km and will be looking to the more selective mountain tests to come, starting with Friday’s third stage.

Vasil Kiryienka helped lead the line over the final climb as Team Sky muscled to the front with impressive numbers at the expense of Tinkoff-Saxo.

Despite attacks on the descent from Nicolas Edet (Cofidis) and then Carlos Quintero (Colombia) the race came back together for an exciting finish.

Team Sky had an eye on the upcoming GC days, as Sports Director Dario Cioni explained: “Today was a day where we didn’t have big stage ambitions and it was more about coming through the day without losing time. We’re looking more to the next two days ahead which will be important for the GC.

“Pete was the guy who had the job to look after any late attacks and he did a good job of that. We were able to get Chris across the line without issues.

“I’d expect tomorrow’s result to be quite similar to what we see on Saturday. In some ways they are quite similar climbs. Tomorrow’s is a bit longer but on Saturday they will have come off an extra day of hard racing. I’d expect the guys you see up there will be similar and I think Chris has a good chance to be one of them. But we’ve also got four riders inside the top 10 so we’ve got options which is always useful.”