Spain's Alejandro Valverde finished strongly to take the seventh 154.2km León-Alto de El Morredero (Ponferrada) stage of the Tour of Spain (Vuelta) yesterday and now lies only five seconds behind the new overall leader, Janez Brajkovic, who finished fourth.

Overnight Tour leader, Italy's Danilo Di Luca, had a disastrous day, finishing 1 minute, 57 seconds behind the leader, and drops out of the top ten.

Second in yesterday's race was Spain's Carlos Sastre, who now lies third overall, ten seconds behind Brajkovic.

Seventh stage results:

1 Alejandro Valverde
2 Sastre a 4"
3. Marchante a 6"
4. Brajkovic a 7"
5. Beltrán a 7"
6. Vinokourov a 12"
7. Luis Pérez a 16"
8. Kashechkin a 16"
9. Devolder a 23"
10. Marzoli a 29"
11. Mayo a 29"

General classification:

1. Brajkovic
2. Valverde a 5 s
3. Sastre a 10"
4. Marchante a 22"
5. Kashechkin a 23"
6. Beltrán a 51"
7. Marzoli a 1:17
8. Mayo a 2:27
9. Vinokourov a 2:28
10. Luis Pérez a 3:40