Team Sky's Mikel Nieve gave his team-mates some consolation at the Giro d'Italia as the Spaniard took stage 13 with an impressive solo performance.
Andrey Amador of Movistar assumed the overall lead and the maglia rosa from Etixx-QuickStep's Bob Jungels, but it was Nieve who won the race's first high-mountain stage, repeating the feat he achieved in 2011.
The victory comes as a welcome morale-boost for Team Sky following Mikel Landa's early exit at stage 10 with a stomach bug on Tuesday.
"After the abandon of Landa, it was very disappointing and the Giro team was of course a little low on morale," Nieve said.
"We wanted to win stages and we are very happy to do it today. After getting in the break I felt good. I was good on the climbs but the descents were very complicated. Thankfully I managed to get down them on my own."
Nieve was part of an early escape group but pulled away from the pack on the penultimate climb, the category one Cima Porzus, and he never looked back.
Movistar's Italian rider Giovanni Visconti finished second with Astana's Vincenzo Nibali, also from Italy, in third.
Ireland's Nicolas Roche finished in 40th for Team Sky, 10 minutes and nine seconds behind his Nieve. Their team-mate Philip Deignan was 32 minutes and 43 seconds back in 148th.
Roche is 33rd in the general classification, with Deignan 118th overall.
Spray that champagne @NieveMikel! 🍾🍾🍾 #Giro 🇮🇹🇮🇹🇮🇹 pic.twitter.com/iOj5m2ExWm
— Team Sky (@TeamSky) May 20, 2016
