Brasstown Bald, GA - Rory Sutherland is an exceptional all-around rider, but he's not known as the type of climber you'd expect to see at the front of the race on the steep slopes of a mountain like Brasstown Bald.

Yet, the 26-year-old Australian followed up his strong second-place performance in Stage 5 to Dahlonega with an impressive fourth place finish at the top of Brasstown, just 0:33 behind stage winner and new race leader Kanstantin Sivtsou (High Road). Trent Lowe (Slipstream) finished 0:10 back of Sivtsou, with Levi Leipheimer (Astana) coming third at 0:16. Sutherland finished two seconds ahead of former Vuelta e Espana podium finisher and Tour de France Best Young Rider winner Oscar Sevilla (Rock Racing).

"I knew from the day before I was going well," Sutherland said of his Stage 5 performance, in which he not only got over the final climb with the 22-man front group of the race leaders, but finished second in the bunch sprint. "I was definitely on a good day again today."

Sutherland achieved today's result through a combination of good tactics and smart riding. "Coming from a smaller team, I knew I could play off the others on the final climb," he said. "But I also planned to ride my own tempo up the climb and not follow the surges of guys like Levi and Trent. I didn't want to hit it on the climb until the last kilometer."

When things blew up at the base of the climb, Sutherland kept his cool and didn't try to match the pace of Leipheimer or Lowe. "I got dropped in the first kilometer of the climb," he said. "There was no reason to go hard and blow up."

Which is exactly what happened to a number of riders who tried to match the accelerations. "Seven or eight guys went hard, and the other guys just popped trying to follow the move," he said.

Meanwhile, Sutherland began to claw his way back up closer to the front of the race, and pick off other riders along the way.

"I'm in good condition and I'm climbing well right now, so I have to take the opportunity when it comes," he said.

Notes

Sutherland's 4th place performance enabled him to jump from 44th overall up to 9th overall with a flat circuit in Atlanta remaining on Sunday.

Young climber Matt Cooke of Health Net Presented by Maxxis also put in a strong performance on the slopes of Brasstown, finishing a solid 19th, 2:52 behind the stage winner.

Corey Collier of Health Net Presented by Maxxis, who sustained a deep gash, bruises and road rash in the high-speed crash in Stage 3, continued to grind his way through the Tour de Georgia and finished 84th on the stage, virtually ensuring he will make it to the final finish line in Atlanta Sunday. "He's showed a lot of courage this week," Sutherland noted.