Chaves, with an eye on getting back in red, attacked out of the chasing group and reeled the British rider in and although Dumoulin tried to chase him down, was unable to hold onto the jersey as Orica-GreenEdge took their second successive win following Caleb Ewan’s victory yesterday. Chaves took Thursday’s uphill victory and snatched back the red leader’s jersey that he lost to Tom Dumoulin (The Netherlands/Giant-Alpecin) Wednesday.

He remains five seconds clear of Tom Dumoulin (Team Giant-Alpecin) and 15 ahead of Roche, while Martin stays fourth at 24 seconds.

“This was probably the last stage I could go for because I’m not planning on going through the whole tour”, he said.

Title hopeful Nairo Quintana protected his four-second gap over Froome at 36 seconds off Chaves’ lead.

“[Directeur sportif] Neil Stephens told me that the first bit of the climb was really steep so I knew where to make my move”.

“They respect me, that’s the main thing for me, and that’s the difference between me and a lot of other neo-pros”. In this part I had really good legs, and Daryl [Impey] put me in a great position.

“I will say again – the team is really incredible”. There’s just one second between the pair.

Cyril Gautier (Europcar), Niki Terpstra (Etixx-QuickStep), Kristijan Durasek (Lampre-Merida), Peter Velits (BMC) and Steven Cummings (MTN-Qhubeka) were given short shrift by LottoNL-Jumbo and Team Colombia, the latter eventually sending Miguel Angel Rubiano up the road in pursuit. This team is like a family for me. Behind Dan Martin (Cannondale-Garmin) attacked hard, followed by a Cofidis and a Katusha rider.

Team Sky rider and 2015 Tour de France victor Chris Froome finished 12th, two seconds behind Ewan’s time of three hours, 57 minutes and 28 seconds, and sits seventh overall, 35 seconds behind Dumoulin.

Thursday’s sixth stage is a 200.3km ride from Cordoba and Sierra de Cazorla with a finish on a third category summit.

Friday will be a key stage that ends on a 20-km ascent to Capilleira.