Bradley Wiggins is sitting pretty - just five seconds off the pace - after another solid display from Team Sky on stage two of the Tour of Murcia.

Wiggins, who will fancy his chances of breaching that gap on Saturday's penultimate time trial stage, was kept out of trouble by his hard-working team-mates and eventually led the squad home in 31st position.

It was Robert Hunter who emerged victorious for the second day in succession after he outsprinted Graeme Brown and Vicente Reynés once again.

That same trio had fought out an enthralling battle on Wednesday in San Pedro del Pinatar and positioned themselves at the fore again as the peloton hurtled its way into Caravaca de la Cruz.

Despite their best efforts, neither Brown (Rabobank) nor Reynés (HTC-Columbia) could match Hunter's late kick however as the Garmin-Transitions star crossed the line with his arms aloft, ensuring a carbon-copy of Wednesday's podium positions.

After a fiery start to the day, with numerous attacks on the first ascent of the Alto de San Juan, 10 riders eventually made it clear of the peloton with just over 100km to go. Team Sky quickly assumed their position at the front of the chase group and had hauled the breakaway back by the time the riders took on their second climb of the San Juan, 40km from the finish.

Having already muscled his way into that initial breakaway group, Vacansoleil's Serguey Lagutin attacked once again on San Juan and quickly built himself a lead of around two minutes as he tore down the steep descent.

This time it was Garmin-Transitions who reacted and Lagutin held on doggedly until around 2km from the line.

With the bunch back together in the closing stages Hunter's power again proved the difference after another storming finish.

Elingworth encouraged

Sports director Rod Elingworth was encouraged with the way events had panned out for Team Sky after a testing start to the day.

He told us: "It was bit hectic at first, and a little bit different to what we had planned, because ideally we would have liked to have had a rider in that initial breakaway group.

"That wasn't to be though so we had to commit most of the team to try and bring that group back.

"The effort of doing that pretty much finished the all those guys off so Brad only had Morris Possoni with him for the last 50km.

"We would've liked to have had a few more people around at that point, but Morris did a great job to deliver Brad home.

"It was quite a hard day today but the lads did a great job in the end."

Friday's stage is a 166.5km trek from Las Torres de Cotillas to Alhama de Murcia, with two category 1 climbs coming late in the day which have the potential to split the field wide open.

Elingworth remains confident though that the team is capable of keeping Wiggins in contention at the top of the overall standings.

"Tomorrow should be quite a hard day again with a lot of activity early on," he added.

"I think it'll come down to those final two climbs, which are practically on top of one another, and we have to make sure Bradley stays in the front group.

"The aim is to get Bradley through on the same time as the leader as that gives him every chance of being in the top three overall at the finish."