Acqua & Sapone’s Giovanni Lombardi won his second stage in three days Friday, winning a sprint while defending champion Dario Frigo widened his overall lead in the Tour de Romandie in Switzerland.

Lombardi's Acqua & Sapone team set up the 32-yea-old with perfection, delivering him an easy victory over Saulius Ruskys (Gerolsteiner) and Mapei's Robert Hunter.

Frigo finished 10th as the main bunch split coming into the finish and the Italian took an additional five seconds on his key rivals.

Racers slogged through heavy rains for the third consecutive day and there's no let-up expected in Saturday's climbing stage to Leysin.

Because of snow and freezing rain above 1200 meters, organizers eliminated the Category 1 climb over the Col des Planches early in Saturday's stage and trimmed it from 144 kms to 109.7.

The stage still hits the category-one climb to Villars-sur-Ollon and finishes at 1,318 meters at Leysin.

Men at work: Lozano and Pronk were caught with 26km to go

Photo: Graham Watson

Rabobank's Matthe Pronk and Kelme's Roberto Lozano attacked after 55 km and built up a five-minute lead before the peloton became interested.

Tacconi and Acqua & Sapone joined forces and put an end to the escape with 26km to go.

Frigo, meanwhile, extended his overall lead by five seconds to 16 over Swiss cyclist Alexandre Noos, benefiting from the cooperative effort with the Acqua & Sapone team.