New Zealand's Ally Wollaston reeled in defending champion Noemi Ruegg with a blistering finish for back-to-back stage wins and held on to her ochre leader's jersey in the Tour Down Under in Adelaide on Sunday.
Switzerland's Ruegg (EF Education-Oatly) looked set to claim the 130.7km second stage in the uphill dash into Paracombe in sweltering temperatures but could not hold off the storming sprint by Wollaston (FDJ United-Suez).
Wollaston will take a 14-second lead into Monday's final 126.5km stage over England's Josie Nelson (Team Picnic PostNL), who again finished on the podium with her third placing.
Ruegg lies third, a further three seconds behind in the general classification. Canada's Olivia Baril (Movistar Team) is fourth with Poland's Marta Lach (Team SD Worx) fifth.
It was Wollaston's third stage victory overall in the UCI World Tour opener and comes after her powerful sprint finish to claim Saturday's first stage in Willunga.
"I found it hard to move up today, but in the last 10km, something just switched on mentally and if I know it's going to come down to a sprint, then I have the chance," Wollaston said.
"I just had full belief in my team that they could do it, it was such a strong breakaway and the burden fell on us to chase and the girls just gave everything they could to catch the break."
The final stage will feature two climbs up Corkscrew Hill, which will favour the climbers.
"It's really special to hang on to the leader's jersey for two days in a row and I'll give everything to hang on to it," Wollaston said.
Ruegg, who won last year's TDU on the demanding Willunga Hill climb, fancies her chances of defending her tour title on Monday.
"I expect tomorrow to be a very hard day, the GC is still quite open, so it's going to be fireworks the second time up the Corkscrew and I take a lot of confidence into tomorrow from today," Ruegg said.