Nairo Quintana (Movistar) took an impressive solo victory in today's mountaintop finish in the Volta a Catalunya. 6 seconds later, his team captain Alejandro Valverde beat Joaquin Rodriguez (Katusha) and Bradley Wiggins in a 3-man sprint to take over the leader's jersey on an incredible day for the Spanish team.

Nairo Quintana put in a strong counterattack just as Joaquin Rodriguez had put down the hammer in an attempt to get rid of his main rivals for the overall classification. At apparent ease, he soloed away from a number of the world's most distinguished climbers to finally take his first WorldTour victory.

Behind Alejandro Valverde acted as the consummate teammate. He stayed on Rodriguez' wheel and forced the little Spaniard to chase valiantly. When they reached the top 6 seconds behinds Quintana, the Spaniard put in a strong acceleration and beat his rival easily in the sprint.

It was a perfectly set up scenario for the Movistar team. Most of the day the team had contributed to the pace-making to keep the day's 4-rider break under control. When they entered the final climb, Eros Capecchi tapped on at the head of the peloton to gradually reduce the size of the peloton. As they neared the top, Blanco, Sky and Katusha all took over while Quintana and Valverde bided their time.

When Bradley Wiggins put in one of his rare attacks inside the final two kilometres, Quintana had no problem responding. As the Brit faded, Rodriguez launched one of his trademark attacks and that was the signal for the Colombian to show his intentions. With this victory, he gets some consolation for a missed opportunity in the Paris-Nice where a crash forced him to lose any opportunity of overall victory.

Quintana had failed to join the 13-man group in stage 1 and so he is only 6th at GC. But with teammate Valverde the best of the rest, the Spanish team enters tomorrow's queen stage with another mountaintop finish in a perfect position.

4 riders form the day's escape

The third stage was always going to be a big battle between the biggest favourites. At 180 km, with 3 categorized climbs and finishing atop an HC mountain, the stage satisfied all requirements to be the scene of a great drama.

The early actors in that drama were the quartet of Nicolas Edet (Cofidis), Karol Domagalski (Caja Rural), Lucas Haedo (Cannondale) and Martin Kohler (BMC). They made up the day's early escape and quickly built a gap of more than 8 minutes.

Omega Pharma-Quick Step knew that Meersman had no chance to protect his lead, so the Belgian team did not take on the chase. Instead it was left to Katusha, Sky, Movistar, Lotto and Vacansoleil to join forces in an attempt to set up Rodriguez, Wiggins, Valverde, Jurgen Van Den Broeck and Thomas De Gendt for a stage win and possibly overall glory.

Blanco increases the pace

On the day's first climb, the tempo picked up dramatically, and the gap was brought down to 5 minutes as Robert Gesink put his team at the front to tire out his rivals ahead of the final mountain. As things calmed down on the descent, the gap grew back up to 7 minutes, but Katusha, Sky and Movistar were soon back on the front.

On the day's second categorized climb, Domagalski and Edet dropped Haedo and Kohler. Behind, Lotto and later Movistar took care of the chase. As they approached the final climb, the battle for position started, and Vacansoleil took over at the front.

At the bottom of the final climb, Edet attacked and dropped Domagalski. Behind Lotto set a hard tempo, and they were later replaced by Movistar. For a number of kilometres Eros Capecchi did a huge amount of work for his Spanish team, and Haedo, Kohler and Domagalski were all caught.

The group was still quite large and not much action took place in the peloton. Gesink decided to once again apply the pressure and asked young Steven Kruijswijk to up the pace.

The first attacks

Finally, Marcos Garcia (Caja Rural) put in the first attack. He was followed by Van Den Broeck, and it required some effort for a struggling Gesink to close the gap with the rest of the group in tow. Van Den Broeck countered, and he built up a gap. He caught and passed Edet and soloed on towards the top.

The Belgian was a danger man and so Sky had to take action. They put their train on the front, and Dario Cataldo put on a furious pace which kept the Lotto captain under control. He was later replaced by Uran who led the peloton as Tom Danielson (Garmin) put in a number of attacks.

The American finally got clear and joined up with Van Den Broeck in the front. This forced Katusha into action, and Simon Spilak took up the chase. The hard tempo now forced a massive selection, and plenty of riders lost contact in the drastically reduced group.

Spilak brought back Danielson and Van Den Broeck, but soon after Wiggins attacked. He was joined by Thibaut Pinot (FDJ) and Quintana, but as the Brit faded more and more riders got back on. This was the signal for Rodriguez to put in his acceleration. Quintana followed easily, and the Spanish Katusha captain had no answer as the Colombian countered and soloed to an impressive victory for his Spanish squad.

Starting at 15.15, you can follow all the action in tomorrow's queen stage live on CyclingQuotes.com/live.