Cannondale's Peter Sagan won the third stage of the Amgen Tour Of California.
The temperatures were not as warm as for the previous two stages as the riders minus three non starters set off on the 177.7km route from Palmdale to Santa Clarita.
Radio Shack's Jens Voigt was the first rider to try and break away but was soon caught and then the German joined in the next break of 23 riders in Laurent Didier, Bob Jungels and Andy Schleck (RadioShack Leopard), Tyler Farrar and Jacob Rathe (Garmin-Sharp), Sylvain Chavanel (Omega Pharma QuickStep), Tejay van Garderen, Brent Bookwalter, Mathias Frank & Michael Schär (BMC), Baden Cooke, Cameron Meyer & Travis Meyer (Orica-GreenEdge), Peter Sagan & Guillaume Boivin (Cannondale), Michael Rogers & Jonas Aaen Jörgensen (Team Saxo-Tinkoff), Juan Antonio Flecha (Vacansoleil-DCM), Christopher Baldwin and Carter Jones (Bissell) and Alexander Candelario (Optum p/b Kelly Benefit Strategies).
After Bert Grabsch had withdrawn, Carter Jones took the first King Of The Mountains climb but as the escapers got to the line, they were joined by the peloton and a new break from Andy Schleck (RadioShack Leopard), Lieuwe Westra (Vacansoleil-DCM), Chad Beyer (Champion System) and Gavin Mannion (Bontrager).formed.
They passed through cowboy country with a lead of 4.10 and after 86.1kms, Beyer took the points for the second King Of The Mountain's climb on the category 4 Lake Hughes Rd.
With 66kms to go, the gap was down to three minutes and it was still that when Lieuwe Westra took the points at the second sprint of the day at Leona Valley with 42kms to go.
Seven kilometres later, Andy Schleck took the points at the Bouquet Canyon Road climb as Mannion was swept up.
With twenty kilometres left, the gap had diminished to forty seconds. Two and a half kilometres later, Beyer decided to go it alone.
Westra and Schleck were soon caught by the peloton and so was Beyer with 13.5kms left.
Cannondale with Peter Sagan prominent, led the peloton down the straight three lane road, past a florist and Shell garage, before Saxo Tinkoff took up the pace with 2.6kms to go. Behind them, there was a crash and Ryan Eastman went down.
Riders were all over the road trying to gain a good position going into the final kilometre. Under the flam rouge and UnitedHealthCare were ahead.
The sprint was launched and it was Peter Sagan who took his ninth Tour Of California win in a time of 4.20.31 by coming from the right to snatch victory from Michael Matthews, Farrar, Meersman and Van Poppel.
Janier Acevedo keeps his lead from Van Garderen by twelve seconds and 27 seconds ahead of Ireland's Phillip Deignan