Kansas City, MO - Jeff Louder of the Health Net Pro Cycling Team Presented Maxxis earned the first Michelob Ultra King of the Mountains jersey at the Tour of Missouri.

He took the uphill sprint ahead of Will Frischkorn (Slipstream-Chipotle) out of one of the several breaks that tried to get away on the stage's first set of hills after the first sprint line in Parkville. Louder bridged up to a small break that already contained his teammate Frank Pipp inside 1 km to the KoM line.

"We got up to the break pretty close to the line," Louder said. "Jeff (Corbett) and Mike (Tamayo) didn't realize we had made it up to the break, because they were yelling for Frank to go for the points. A moment later, we heard Frank yelling 'Go, go, go' over the radio

"When Will attacked, a few guys followed so I went, too. I wasn't sure I was going to get past the Saunier Duval-Prodir guy," he said. "It was a hard sprint."

Johnson makes a break for it

Tim Johnson of Health Net Presented by Maxxis initiated the main break of the day at 25 miles into the stage. "I attacked right after a climb," he said. "The peloton was strung out and there were a lot of cross winds."

The break soon settled at five riders, with Valeriy Kobzarenko (Navigators), Tyler Wren (Colavita-Sutter Home), Phillip Mamos (Sparkasse) and James Meadley (Jelly Belly).

"The break was working well the entire day," Johnson said. "No one was sitting on. It was tough. There were headwinds out to the top of circuit, cross winds across the top and a tailwind on the way back in. We kept the pressure on the pedals all the way. Once we got a gap it was a matter of losing as little time as possible."

When the gap got out to over five minutes, Johnson said the stage win looked like a possibility. But when the gap started coming down in the final 40 km, the priority changed to staying away for as long as possible to keep the pressure off our guys before the sprint.

When the break reached the start/finish line for the beginning of the first of three five-mile circuits the gap had dropped to 1:55. "To have any chance at the stage win, we would've needed a gap of 2:30," Johnson said.

On the second time up the climb on Ward Parkway, with the gap dropping to around 30 seconds, Johnson attacked his break mates, with only Kobzarenko and Mamos hanging on. "At that point, I just wanted to make sure break lasted as long as possible," he said. "It kept the peloton calm, kept Discovery on the front working a little longer and kept the pressure off our guys a little longer."

Coming into the end of the second circuit, the break was finally absorbed after nearly 55 miles off the front of the 85-mile stage. A series of attacks during the final lap were quickly covered, setting up a sprint finish.

In the sprint up Ward Parkway, Karl Menzies of Health Net Presented by Maxxis was in the think of the front end of the bunch but got boxed in and was unable to get to the front. The stage was won by Ivan Dominguez (Toyota-United), with Zach Bell (Symmetrics) and Kyle Wamsley (Navigators) taking second and third.