BMC Racing Team's Cadel Evans followed the moves of race leader Vincenzo Nibali (Astana) on Tuesday's mountain-top finish at the Giro d'Italia to keep his hold on second place overall and remain the points classification leader.

Evans finished fifth on the stage, in the same time as Nibali, and 31 seconds after Rigoberto Uran (Sky Procycling) soloed to the stage win. Nibali earned bonus time for his third-place finish and on an intermediate sprint to widen his lead on Evans from 29 to 41 seconds.

Evans said he was pleased to hold onto second place on the first major mountain stage of the race. "It's probably not going to be a big deal at the end, but I would rather not concede time," he said. "To maintain my position at this point is still very good. So far, so good. We still have a lot of mountain stages to go." Uran is third overall, 2:04 back, and his Sky Procycling teammate, Bradley Wiggins, is one second behind in fourth. "I don't know what was going on behind, of course, but Nibali is the rider I have to focus on at this point considering my place in the classification," Evans said. "Every day that passes is looking more that way. But I know we aren’t even halfway into this Giro yet. So it may still be a little early to say."