Luciano Pagliarini of Brazil was awarded victory on the sixth stage of the Tour of California after Britain's Mark Cavendish was relegated for riding behind a vehicle.

Pagliarini had actually finished second to Cavendish in a sprint to the line, but the Briton was penalised 20 seconds for riding behind a vehicle with about four kilometres left and was dropped to 74th place on the stage.

Champion Levi Leipheimer finished the 175km stage from Santa Barbara in the pack and retained his 49-second lead over Britain's David Millar, while Millar's Slipstream team mate Christian Vandevelde is third overall, a further 19 seconds back.

"I'm very happy," said Pagliarini, who finished the stage in a time of four hours, 18 minutes and 31 seconds. "But it's not like a win with your hands up. I was second and now I am first."

Juan Jose Haedo of Argentina, who won the first stage, was officially classified as second behind Pagliarini with Italy's Paolo Bettini in third.

The final stage of the 1,046-kilometre race on Sunday includes the ascent of Millcreek Summit, the highest point in the race at 1,495 metres.

"It's a big climb, but we have shown we have the strongest team in the mountains," said Astana's Leipheimer, who finished third at last year's Tour de France.

"The team is riding exceptionally strong. So they can definitely do it."

Reuters