Dan Martin delighted with King of the Mountains jersey

Daniel Martin wins, Vuelta a Espana 2011, stage nine

Dan Martin (Garmin-Cervelo) suffered in the long time trial of the Tour of Spain but the stage nine winner on the Covatilla still remains in control of the King of the Mountains competition for a second day running.

Martin has a two point lead over Italy's Matteo Montaguti (Ag2r), with Katusha's Dani Moreno, the stage winner in Sierra Nevada last week in third.

"I said at the start I was coming for stage wins, and I've got one of those so that's mission accomplished," Martin told Cyclng Weekly on Monday.

"It was good for the team morale, too, with two guys [Tyler Farrar and Murilo Fischer] having to abandon."

"Obviously I was going to try and win again, and if the jersey happens it happens. From here on everything is a bonus."

Martin said that he had tried hard in the first 15 kilometres of the time trial, but he "hadn't trained for it. I trained here to win on mountain-tops."

"I'll be looking at the GC later on but that's not the objective for now."

As for his ‘joint' attack with cousin Nicolas Roche (Ag2r) on the Covatilla, Martin said "it wasn't planned. I just looked around and he was there."

"But it was funny, stuff like that - you just couldn't make it up."

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