Fully recuperated from the virus that prevented his participation in the Criterium International, Alberto Contador (Saxo-Tinkoff) made sure his hopes of winning a third title at Tour of the Basque Country were not jeopardized on the first stage on Monday.

Together with teammate Roman Kreuziger Contador was in the 17-man group that broke clear from the main field in the technically challenging run-in to the finish line in Elgoibar, carving out a five-second safeguard prior to Tuesday’s stage.

After the opening stage, won by Simon Gerrans (Orica-GreenEDGE), Contador said that the small time gap between himself and the likes of Samuel Sánchez (Euskaltel-Euskadi), Andrew Talansky (Garmin Sharp) and Andreas Klöden (RadioShack Leopard) among others does little to help pick out who the real contenders are.

“It was a tough stage as usual here in the Basque Country Tour, so that was no surprise,” explained Contador on his team site. "Our team took responsibility from the beginning, since the very first break started with seven riders from some of the favourite's teams, so we had to shut it down. Finally two riders got away and we worked at the front and controlled the gap.”

“The team has worked impressively hard and we were in the front to avoid accidents, which turned out to be a great idea. I only heard something behind, which then turned out to be a crash, but we had no idea what happened. I was focused on following the wheel in front of me. My shape is good, but you cannot really draw any conclusions compared to the overall standings from the day's events.”

Starting at 14.45 on Tuesday you can follow the action from the Vuelta Ciclista al País Vasco live here on Cyclingquotes.com