"We had six guys on the last climb and that gave us a lot of options for the stage. For sure this Paris-Nice will be full gas until Sunday."

Those were the words of Jakob Fuglsang after stage four at Paris-Nice. Fuglsang arrived fourth on the mountaintop finish, eight seconds behind stagewinner Richie Porte of Australia.

Teammates Lars Boom and Rein Taaramäe started the action at the beginning of the eighth and final climb, a first category ascent to the cross-country ski base at Chaubouret. Paolo Tiralongo took over at 8km to go, riding solo off the front to speed up the group of around 30 riders and dominate the team tactics after almost five hours of racing.

Fuglsang then began his attack with less than 5km to the finish, and kept a high pace to leave the rest of the peloton behind, with only Porte's teammate Geraint Thomas of the United Kingdom and Simon Spilak of Slovenia able to follow. Fabio Aru finished eighth, 24 seconds behind Porte - Luis Leon Sanchez was 16th.

Fuglsang now sits in fifth overall in General Classification, just five seconds from a podium spot with three hard days in the mountains ahead.