Joan Almeida showed impressive speed in Friday's stage 5 intermediate sprint to take the race lead in the Volta a Catalunya, but the UAE Team Emirates leader remains cautious about whether he can join the overall contenders in Barcelona on Sunday He has not.

After the first of three post-Pyrenees stages, the GC classification continues to be an interesting close race. Almeida was tied in time with Nairo Quintana, but he closed the gap by finishing third in the intermediate sprint in the second half of the stage and gaining a one second time bonus.

A year after briefly taking the lead in the Catalunya Volta, the 23-year-old Almeida is back in the overall lead, but only one second behind Quintana.

"The winner of the final stage in Barcelona has a great chance of winning the overall," Almeida said.

"With so many riders close together, it will be a stage of concentrated attacks. The climbs on each circuit are very hard and the descents to the finish are crucial. Bonus seconds will definitely be significant."

Almeida, when asked why he was able to take the lead in the intermediate sprint, replied without hesitation as usual.

"It worked out in the end, but just before that I was following my teammate and trying to gain position in the last 500m to stop Nairo's seconds bonus," Almeida recalled.

"The plan was for me to sprint and I was behind my teammate for the leadout, but he lost the wheels of the other guys. So I went for the sprint myself and ended up getting the bonus."

His sprint took place on the side away from the main battle for the bonus and, as Almeida himself admitted, went largely unnoticed.

What mattered was the result.

"If I win, that's great, and if I don't win, I'm not too upset because someone else was better than me," Almeida said.

"The important thing is to do your best.