Today's 163.7 kilometer long ninth stage of Vuelta a España was another mountainous stretch from Antequera to Valdepenas de Jáen where a kilometer long wall with gradients up to 27% was on the menu. A breakaway of five riders tried hard to keep the favourites in the field behind by launching an early escape.

But the escapees were caught by the chasing field at the foot of the penultimate climb with 25 kilometers to go. Then Robert Kiserlovski (Radioshack) leaped away from the chasing pack. Edvald Boasson-Hagen (Sky) suddenly powered away from the field and soon dropped Kiserlovski towards the uphill finish.

But the Norwegian rider was caught as well and on the uphill finish for pure specialists, Daniel Moreno (Katusha) was in a league of his own and he launched one single attack and distanced everyone to take the stage win and overall lead with one second ahead of Nicolas Roche who finished fourth today

“It was a nasty uphill finish but I think I did a good job finishing fourth as this climb is for the specialists. Naturally, I'm a little disappointed about losing the jersey with one second but it's no disaster for us. The race is long and many opportunities ahead of us,” said Saxo-Tinkoff's Nicolas Roche to Saxo-Tinkoff’s webpage.