New Zealand sprinter Greg Henderson notched up his second win in less than a week in Spain when he blasted to victory in stage two of the Tour of Murcia on Thursday.

Following a stage shortened to just three kilometres of real racing because of high winds, the Columbia-Highroad fastman is now in the lead both overall and in the points competition.

“We raced for about 50 kilometres but then it got very windy and guys were getting blown off the road so the organisers decided to neutralise most of the stage,” Henderson explained. “They then told us that the racing would start again just three kilometres from the line. When we reached that point of the course, everybody knew that was when racing would start so there’d been a lot of fighting for position beforehand. On top of that it had just started to rain and the road surfaces weren’t brilliant, so it was all very tense.”

“I took one right-hand curve well,” added Henderson, “and then was about fifth or sixth back coming into a second bend, a sharp left-hander, with about 350 metres to go. Me and Hoffie [sports director Tristan Hoffman] had looked at the route book during the stage to get an idea of the finish and he’d told me to take this corner full gas. It was only when I came into the corner in fifth or sixth place at full gas and noticed at the last moment that everybody else was braking that I got worried!”

Fortunately Henderson stayed upright and ahead of the pack, and he took the stage comfortably. It was his second victory in five days after winning the GP Almeria on Sunday.

“It’s easily my best early season ever, a couple of years ago I got a couple of second places in the Tour of California, but this is where I’m getting the wins. I’ve done a good hard block of training since the Tour of Qatar, and my condition is really good.”

“I’ll do my best to defend the lead in the time trial tomorrow, [Friday]. Even though time trialing is not really my thing, I’ll give it 100 percent and see what happens.”