The riders tackled a 200 kilometre climbing stage from Talavera de la Reina to La Covatilla today, with King featuring as part of a 10-man move.

They enjoyed a lead of around seven minutes with 20km of racing to go, but with two steep climbs to tackle.

King attacked on the penultimate climb to move clear, but was later joined at the front by Bauke Mollema of The Netherlands.

The American moved clear again in the closing kilometres to secure his second stage win of the International Cycling Union (UCI) WorldTour race in a time of 5hr 30min 38sec.

Overall race leader Rudy Molard of France was dropped by the main group of general classification favourites on the final climb to relinquish his lead.

A move featuring Nairo Quintana, Miguel Angel Lopez and Rigoberto Uran of Colombia and the Netherlands’ Wilco Kelderman came across the line at 2:30 down.

Britain’s Yates was nine seconds behind.

It proved enough to put the Mitchelton-Scott rider into the race lead, with Spain’s Alejandro Valverde one second behind.

The event is due to resume on Tuesday (September 4) following the first rest day tomorrow.

Annemiek van Vleuten sealed victory in the Boels Ladies Tour as the Dutch rider won the concluding time trial stage.

She held an 18-second advantage heading into the 19.6 kilometre course and was able to extend that margin further.

Van Vleuten finished in exactly 24 minutes to secure both the stage win and the overall title.

Fellow Dutch rider Ellen van Dijk ended 22 seconds down on the stage, leaving her as the runner-up overall at 52 seconds behind.

Anna van der Breggen completed an all-Dutch top three by ending 1:05 adrift of the winner.