Chris Froome finished second on a thrilling summit showdown at the Vuelta a Espana to climb back up the general classification on stage nine.

In one of the most exciting mountain-top finishes in recent memory, Froome conserved energy and even dropped back at the bottom of the Alto de Puig Llorenca before mounting a rousing late challenge.

Attacking hard inside the final kilometre the Brit pushed clear of his rivals and opened out a gap, only to be caught with 60 metres to go after a powerful late acceleration from Tom Dumoulin (Giant-Alpecin).

Dumoulin took the stage by two seconds and moved into the race lead, but second place saw Froome take time out of many key rivals and jump back up to eighth place overall on the GC - one minute and 18 seconds back on the day's winner.

Nicolas Roche bounced back from an early-stage crash to mix it up on the first-category finale, lifting the pace on numerous occasions before crossing the line in eighth spot. The result sees the Irishman now in fourth position, 1:07 back on Dumoulin.

It was a great all-round team performance with Sergio Henao (14th on GC, +3:13) and Mikel Nieve (11th on GC, +2:17) finishing just outside the top 10 on the stage. That all combined to push Team Sky's team GC lead out to 6:02.

A committed day in the breakaway from Geraint Thomas allowed the Welshman to re-build form and also ensured the team could time its run to the front in the closing stages.

After crossing the line a close second Froome admitted he felt the win was in reach, but took time to thank his team-mates from a strong performance.

"I'm gutted," he said. "I thought I had it for a second there. But Dumoulin has shown incredible form in this race and hats off to him. He's a young rider with a bright future ahead of him.

"The guys did a fantastic job for me today keeping myself, Nicolas Roche, Mikel Nieve and Sergio Henao - the four climbers - at the front of the race, and bringing us into the climb in a perfect position. So we've got them to thank today for all the hard work they did."

Froome set his own tempo on the final climb, meaning he was distanced more than once as attacks fired. After battling back that approach paid dividends as he put time into a host of key rivals at the top.

He explained: "I gave it everything. I did try and ride more conservatively at the bottom to try and save something for an effort at the top if I had the legs. It was not enough but to be honest I'm really happy to be where I am. More than anything I'm just happy that I was up there and didn't lose too much time today."