Alexey Lutsenko on his way to a stage win at Paris-Nice today ©Getty Images

Kazakhstan's Alexey Lutsenko won the fifth stage of Paris-Nice as the peloton made its way from Saint-Paul-Trois-Châteaux to Salon-de-Provence today.

The 23-year-old Astana rider won by 21 seconds ahead of Norway's Alexander Kristoff and Australian race leader Michael Matthews, who retains the overall classification top spot.

Matthews is, however, just six seconds in front of Lutsenko, who has jumped up into second spot thanks to his victory today.

His success came after he caught and broke away from Canadian Antoine Duchesne, who was among an early breakaway group, in the final 20 kilometres of proceedings.

Tomorrow's penultimate stage is arguably the toughest of the whole race, which is part of the International Cycling Union (UCI)'s WorldTour.

It will cover 177km between Nice and Madonne d'Utelle and features seven climbs with a summit finish.

Image title
Antoine Duchesne was overtaken by the Kazakh cyclist after attempting a break ©Getty Images

Elsewhere, stage three of Tirreno-Adriatico, another WorldTour race, went to Fernando Gaviria of Etixx-QuickStep, with the Colombian triumphing following a bunch sprint after a ride from Castelnuovo di Val di Cecina to Montalto di Castro.

Australia's Caleb Ewan came home second with the Orica-GreenEdge beating Team Sky's Italian Elia Viviani into third.

The Czech Republic’s Zdenek Stybar, another QuickStep rider who won stage two yesterday, still leads overall with a 0.09 seconds lead over Italy's Damiano Caruso.

Tomorrow's stage is due to take the peloton from Montalto di Castro to Foligno.