Stage 7 in the 70th Vuelta a España brought about the rare win from a breakaway on a summit finish, but that’s exactly what happened in Friday’s 191,1 km stage from Jódar to La Alpujarra. But in the group of favorites coming in just behind the winners was Team Katusha’s Joaquim Rodriguez, riding in for 12th place on the stage at 36-seconds off the winning time of 5:10.24. Rodriguez’ efforts moved him into sixth place for the general classification.

"Today was the first real test with this long climb and a good chance to see the condition of the riders. Joaquim did very well, finishing in the group with the other GC riders, plus they took time to Chris Froome and Tejay van Garderen so that was good as they were expected to do well. When the break was away there was not much cooperation among the teams. It was a long climb with some headwind before that last kilometer when it was very steep. This is the kind of stage you don’t win the race with, but you can lose the race here, so we’re happy with the performance from Joaquim and will be trying to win a stage," said sports director José Azevedo.

The red leader’s jersey stayed on the back of Esteban Chaves (Orica-GreenEdge) with Tom Dumoulin (Team Giant-Alpecin) remaining in second place at ten seconds and Daniel Martin of Cannondale-Garmin rounding out the GC podium at 33-seconds off the top time of 27:06.13. Joaquim Rodriguez is the best-placed rider for Team Katusha and currently hold sixth place on the overall classification at 56-seconds. Teammate Daniel Moreno is in ninth place.

Saturday marks the start of the second week for the last grand tour of the 2015 cycling season with a 182,5 km stage from Puebla de Don Fadrique to Murcia. It starts with a long downhill but ends with a circuit featuring a category 3 climb.