Telekom's Alexander Vinokourov, won the third stage of the Tour of Switzerland on Friday, the first of four days in the mountains that usually define the Swiss race.

Vinokourov finished ahead of Swiss riders Alex Zülle and Laurent Dufaux at the end of the mountainous 157.6km stage from Domat-Ems to Sammaun. Zülle, winner of the opening prologue, took over the leaders’ jersey with a six-second lead over Vinokourov and nine seconds over Dufaux in the overall classification.

The stage proved to be difficult for several Italian cyclists, among whom were some of the favorites for the race.

Zülle and Tonkov were among those in the winning break.

Photo: Graham Watson

Francesco Casagrande lost more than five minutes on the final climb, Davide Rebellin was five minutes and 36 seconds off the pace while Paolo Savoldelli, the winner of the Giro d’Italia, was down by over 13 minutes.

A group of twenty riders broke away before the day’s biggest climb at Fluela headed by Swiss riders Daniel Schnider, Martin Elmiger, Steve Zampieri as well as Italian champion Daniele Nardello and Kazakh Alexandre Shefer.

By the time they reached the top, they were more than four minutes in front before Swiss rider Martin Elmiger, of the Phonak team, built up a two minute lead on the descent.

However, the final climb towards Samnaun really tested the competitors and the leaders were eventually sucked back in.

Eventually, eight riders broke clear with Zulle, Dufaux, Tonkov, Austria's Peter Luttenberger, Vinokourov, Kim Kirchen of Luxemburg, Poland's Piotr Wadecki and Frenchman Nicolas Fritsch battling it out to the line.

But over the last kilometer, it was Vinokourov who was the freshest and he edged out Zülle to take the stage.