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Cervelo's Thor Hushovd took victory in a bunch sprint on stage 6 of the Tour de France in Barcelona.

After David Millar (Garmin) had been caught in a nail-biting final few kilometres, Hushovd powered past Rabobank's Oscar Freire on the uphill finish in the Montjuic district of the city.

Fabian Cancellara finished in the lead group to retain his yellow jersey ahead of Friday's mountain-top finish in Andorra-Arcalis.

On a rainy, crash-filled day in Northern Spain, it was Millar who set the tone of the stage in a long break. Together with Frenchman Stephane Auge (Cofidis) and Sylvain Chavanel (Quick Step), the Scot managed to break free of a fast-moving peloton after an hour of racing on the descent towards Tossa de Mar.

The trio were unable to gain more than four minutes on the pack, however, with Rabobank, Milram and Cervelo all looking to take advantage of an uphill finish that would likely work against the hitherto dominant Mark Cavendish.

With 77 kilometres remaining, three became four out front as Euskaltel's Amets Txurruka used the third-category Collsacreu to bridge the gap.

The peloton worked to whittle the gap down, however, and with 30 kilometres remaining had closed to within 1'30" of the leaders.

This was the trigger for Millar to launch a big attack, to which none of the other three reacted immediately.

Txurruka waited again for the final categorised climb of the day, the Côte de la Conreria, to again try and make up ground, while Remi Pauriol (Cofidis) attacked from the peloton.

Txurruka briefly looked to be catching Millar on the descent of the Conreria, though his diminutive stature worked against him on the subsequent flat terrain, and Pauriol joined him before the pair were both caught 10 kilometres from the finish.

Millar, meanwhile, was in full time-trial mode out front, making a highly impressive job of holding out against the combined efforts of the Rabobank, Milram, Cervelo and Liquigas teams.

The Scot began to tire over the last five kilometres though, and he was finally caught at the foot of the uphill climb to Montjuic.

With Cavendish unable to keep pace on the ascent, Freire pushed himself to the fore, though found himself at the front too early with 500 metres remaining.

Fillippo Pozzatto (Katusha) launched his charge on the opposite side, and though Freire managed to drag himself across to the wheel of the Italian, he could do nothing when Hushovd moved out of his slipstream to power his way to the line.

Cavendish finished 16th to conserve his lead in the sprinters' green jersey competition by a single point, with Gerald Ciolek (Milram) 50 points back in third position.

Denis Menchov's (Rabobank) nightmare Tour continued as he rolled in 1'02" off the pace.

STAGE SEVEN LIVE on Friday 10th July at 12.30pm on British Eurosport (Sky 410 / Virgin Media 521); Also available on your PC via the Eurosport Player - click on the link under the picture to subscribe

Michael FitzGerald / Eurosport