Chris Froome turned in his strongest climbing performance in a Volta a Catalunya to date on Friday, with the Team Sky rider moving into second overall after taking second on the ascent of Lo Port. When teammate Geraint Thomas, previously third overall and leading Sky in Catalunya, cracked towards the summit of the eight kilometre climb, Froome, previously fifth, knew that he should fight for his own chances. The Sky rider shadowed Alejandro Valverde (Movistar) and then Alberto Contador (Trek-Segafredo) in the closing kilometres as a leading quartet formed along with Valverde`s teammate Marc Soler, then Valverde opened up a gap to go it alone.ADVERTISEMENT Froome came across the line in second just ahead of Contador in what constitutes his best result to date in the Volta a Catalunya, a race where he has taken a sixth and an eighth overall in 2016 and 2014 but never performed so strongly on a high mountain stage. Thomas finished 14th on the stage, and dropped to seventh on GC. `It was a tough day,` Froome, now second at 21 seconds with two days remaining, told Cyclingnews after the stage. `The plan was to move G [Thomas] up on GC, but a couple of kilometres from the top, when Contador and Valverde put in a big move along with Soler - who did an amazing ride - they put in a move and I followed that and G said at that point `don`t wait, don`t wait, go on.` `So I wasn`t really expecting to do that kind of a ride today, my first big mountain top finish at WorldTour level this year. I`m really happy with that and I think I can take a lot of confidence away from that and build on that.`
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