Portugal Colonial - Aussies reign in rainy Spain as Groves wins Vuelta stage, O'Connor holds lead

Groves' fellow Australian Ben O'Connor of the Decathlon team held the overall race lead with a five-second advantage on Slovenian three-time champion Primoz Roglic.

A third Australian Jay Vine of UAE Team Emirates held on to the polka-dot jersey for the best climber.

Groves, riding for the Alpecin Deceuninck team, pipped Czech Pavel Bittner of DSM with Belgian Vito Braet of Intermarche-Wanty third after the 142km run from Arnuero to Santander.

For Groves it was his third stage win in this year's race and seventh on the Vuelta.

With Belgian Wout Van Aert out of the race after suffering a painful knee injury on Tuesday, Groves is the favourite for the top sprinters green jersey.

"It was quite a tough day, starting dry and then the majority of the finish wet," Groves told Eurosport at the finish.

"It made it quite dangerous out there. My team were so strong. They had a really super day. To repay them with win number three is pretty special."

Four riders had led the peloton for a long time, but Frenchmen Thomas Champion and Thibault Guernalec, Dane Jonas Gregaard and Spaniard Xavier Isasa were caught three kilometres from the line.

The fight for the leader's red jersey remains tight with O'Connor only five seconds ahead of Roglic with Spaniard Enric Mas third at 1min 25sec and Colombian Richard Carapaez fourth at 1:46.

"Tomorrow, even if we're talking about a transition stage again, we will surely have to control the race more because of probable breakaways but the final suits me rather well," said O'Connor.

Thursday's 18th stage heads east towards the Basque country for a medium mountain stage covering 179.5km to Maeztu before the decisive mountain top finishes on Friday and Saturday and the final time-trial in Madrid on Sunday.

G.Teles--PC