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Brajkovic takes yellow jersey

Sorgues - Slovenian Janez Brajkovic of the RadioShack team claimed victory in the third stage time trial of the Dauphine Criterium to take possession of the race's yellow jersey on Wednesday.

Brajkovic clocked a time of 1hr 01min 51sec for a technically challenging 49km course, beating David Millar of Garmin-Transitions by 26secs and overnight leader Alberto Contador of Astana by 1min 46sec.

The Slovenian, who is expected to play a key role for team-mate Lance Armstrong in next month's Tour de France, now leads Millar by 36sec in the overall standings ahead of four days of climbing in the French Alps.

American Tejay Van Garderen of HTC-Columbia was pushed down to third overall at 50sec behind with Contador now fourth at 1:41.

Two-time Tour de France champion Contador started the day with the race leader's jersey, and was hoping to claim a second victory in the race on the new time trial bike on which he won Sunday's prologue.

However he was never in the mix for the win. At the first intermediate time point at 15.5km the Spanish all-rounder trailed Brajkovic by a massive 36sec.

Millar was disappointed to miss out on winning a stage he had been targeting, however the big Scot admitted he was happy with his performance -- especially as he narrowly avoided crashing twice on tight corners.

He came over the finish line in a time of 1:02:17 to depose Team Sky's Edvald Boasson Hagen from top spot on the provisional podium.

But only minutes later Brajkovic cruised over the finish line in 1:01:51, pushing Millar down into second.

Thursday's fourth stage in this key Tour de France warm-up event is a steadily rising 210.5km ride from Saint-Paul-Trois-Chateaux to the summit of Risoul.

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