"On the climb I was feeling bad but I'm a good descender and I just went to the front to make the finish hard."

Those were the words of Astana's Rein Taaramäe after stage two at the Tour de Romandie. Taaramäe attacked the leading group of around 40 riders after the final categorized climb of the day, and quickly established a 25-second gap with 10km to go on a narrow and twisty decent into the finish at St Imier.

No other teams could produce a sufficient chase until after the descent, and only with 3km to go did the peloton catch Taaramäe to set up a sprint finish. Taaramäe and his teammates Michele Scarponi, Jakob Fuglsang and Vincenzo Nibali all finished in the front group in the same time as stage winner Michael Albasini of Switzerland, who also takes over as race leader with three more road stages and one individual time trial to go.