TOUR DE FRANCE: Contador makes his move and closes gap on Schleck

 ALBERTO Contador carved a chunk out of Andy Schleck's lead in the 2010 Tour de France with a lung-busting attack in the summit finish to stage 12 in Mende.

Contador, the defending champion, made his break with 2.2km of the 208.5km stage from Bourg de Peage to Mende - and while Schleck responded, he could not stick with to the Spaniards wheel.

Whereas in the Alps, Schleck was swift to respond to Contador's attacks, this time, the Saxo Bank rider was forced to grit his teeth and dig deep before limiting his loss to ten seconds.

Contador was second over the line as Joaquin Rodriguez took the sprint finish and the Contador's Astana teammate Alexandre Vinokourov was third.

It's Rodriguez's first Grand Tour stage victory, but having sampled life on top of the podium, the Katusha rider is keeping his fingers crossed it won't be his last win this year.

"It was a great victory for me today. It was a question of biding my time and then at the end giving it a final push, I was just trying to avoid panicking to be honest," said Rodriguez.

"It was nice for me to be competing with some of the guys who are high up in the general classification . The Pyrenees are coming and we will see if I'm actually able to do something up there because that's very important for me." 

In finishing ten seconds ahead of Schleck, Contador is now 31 seconds adrift in the general classification with the Pyrenees looming large.

Vinokourov, Andreas Kloden, Ryder Hesjedal, Vasil Kiryienka were part of a four-man breakaway that stayed ahead of the peleton for the majority of the stage, only for Kloden and Hesjedal to die away and be swallowed up by the bunch.

The final few kilometres of the stage saw a category two climb to the finishing line and it was there that Contador seized his opportunity and closed the gap as he sets about bidding for a third maillot jaune.