Chaves secures second stage victory to regain overall Vuelta a España lead

Colombia's Esteban Chaves' second stage victory saw him retake the Vuelta a España red jersey ©Getty Images

Colombia’s Esteban Chaves regained the red jersey at the Vuelta a España by claiming his second stage victory of the race as he powered clear of the field to win the seventh stage from Córdoba to Sierra de Cazorla today.

The 200 kilometres route perfectly suited the climbing ability of the Orica-GreenEdge rider as he was able to demonstrate his prowess on the summit finish to wrestle back the overall lead from The Netherlands’ Tom Dumoulin.

Chaves finished the course in a time of 4 hours 46min 16sec to cross the line five seconds in front of the chasing group, with Cannondale-Garmin’s Daniel Martin second and Dumoulin of the Giant-Alpecin outfit third.

The Dutchman struggled to keep pace with Chaves as the Colombian attacked 2.4km from the finish, leaving Dumoulin in his wake to ensure he goes into tomorrow’s eighth stage on top of the leaderboard.

“I can’t believe it,” he told Eurosport.

“It’s really unbelievable as it was a long, hot, hard stage today,”

“[Directeur sportif] Neil Stephens told me that the first bit of the climb was really steep so I knew where to make my move.

“Daryl [Impey] put me in a really good position and I started the climb in first position.

“When I saw the others suffering I went for it.

Colombia's Esteban Chaves sprinted clear of the rest of the field towards the end of stage seven to secure his second win of this year's race ©Getty Images

“I will say again - the team is really amazing.

“Caleb Ewan won yesterday but today he went for bottles and this team is like a family for me.”

Chaves now leads the general classification by 10 seconds ahead of Dumoulin, with Martin a further 23 seconds adrift.

Team Sky’s Irishman Nicolas Roche was 10th during stage seven and he is fourth on the overall standings, 36 seconds off the pace.

Spaniard Alejandro Valverde of the Movistar team is fifth, with some of the race favourites, including Tour de France Winner Chris Froome and Chaves’ compatriot Nairo Quintana, all lurking in dangerous positions inside the top ten.

Briton Froome of Team Sky is seventh ahead of Joachim Rodriguez of Spain, who rides for Katusha, Quintana and Astana’s Italian rider Fabio Aru.

Tomorrow’s stage eight involves a mountainous 191.1km route from Jódar to La Alpujarra.