The stage which started with a minute's silence and then applause for Laurent Fignon, and went through Almeria from Guadix to Lorca.
Pierre Rolland (Bbox Bouygues Telecom), Jose Vicente Toribio (Andalucia CajaSur), Arnaud Labbe (Cofidis) and David Gutierrez ( Footon-Servetto), broke clear early on.
They built up a gap of over five minutes but it down to three minutes with less than 50km to go.
It was all over with 13km left as the peleton swept them up in their charge for the finish.
This was a stage for the sprinters and HTC Colombia were at the front trying to get Mark Cavendish in pole position with Lampre and Quick Step. Cavendish went a long way out but he was pipped on the line by Garmin's Tyler Farrar (pictured below) and Euskatel's Coldo Fernandez.
"Of course it's always nice to win against the best sprinter in the world but it's even better to win a stage at the Vuelta. I'm very happy," said Farrar to cyclingnews.com after the race.
Phillippe Gilbert keeps his leaders red jersey from Igor Anton by ten seconds.
Stage six tomorrow is from Carvaca de Cruz to Murcia.
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Brititsh riders Rogers Hammond and Daniel Lloyd have announced they are moving to Garmin for next season. Their current team Cervelo has announced that they will no longer be the title sponsor and the team has teamed up with Garmin with Cervelo being bike sponsor of the Garmin team from January 1st.
Along with Hammond and Lloyd (pictured below), Garmin announced it was also taking Heinrich Haussler, Andreas Klier, Brett Lancaster and Gabriel Rasch.
"Team Garmin-Cervélo's roster will be strong and versatile," said Garmin team manager Jonathan Vaughters to cyclingnews.com. "All of these riders bring a lot of experience to what's already a great team. I'm proud of what we've done since 2008, and I'm excited for what we'll do in 2011."