Matthew Brennan emerged victorious in the 16th stage of the Vuelta a Espana to claim his fourth stage win of this year's race.

The British Visma Lease-a-bike rider sprinted to victory ahead of Bryan Coquard and Vito Braet in Palos de la Frontera.

Brennan, 21, held up four fingers to celebrate each of his four stage wins in his first Grand Tour.

"It's unbelievable, four victories here and the plan was for one," Brennan said after the 181km stage.

Stage 16 was expected to be another chance for the sprinters.

A five-man breakaway got up the road early on, but with 100km remaining the peloton started to reel them in. The break was caught with around 23km remaining, setting up the bunch sprint finale.

Spanish rider Enric Mas of Team Movistar maintained his 2min 6sec general classification lead on Felix Gall, with Primoz Roglic a further four seconds behind.

The next stage takes place on Wednesday, consisting of 185km from Dos Hermanas to Seville, offering another sprint finale.

Vuelta stage 16 results

Matthew Brennan (GB/Team Visma Lease-a-bike) 03hrs 56mins 33secs

Bryan Coquard (Fra/Cofidis) Same time

Vito Braet (Bel/Lotto Intermarche)

Jord Meeus (Bel/Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe)

Magnus Cort (Den/Uno-X Mobility)

Wout van Aert (Bel/Team Visma Lease-a-Bike)

Hugo Hofstetter (Fra/NSN Cycling Team)

Vincenzo Albanese (Ita/EF Education-EasyPost)

Alberto Dainese (Ita/Soudal Quick-Step)

Cesar Macias (Mex/Burgos-BH)

General classification after stage 16

Enric Mas (Spa/Movistar Team) 56hrs 02mins 29secs

Félix Gall (Aut/Decathlon CMA CGM Team) +2mins 06secs

Primoz Roglic (Slo/Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe) +2mins 10secs

Richard Carapaz (Ecu/EF Education-EasyPost) +4mins 24secs

Oscar Onley (GB/Netcompany Ineos Cycling) +5mins 44secs

Jakob Omrzel (Slo/Bahrain Victorious) +6mins 14secs

Mattias Skjelmose (Den/Lidl-Trek) +6mins 49secs

Cristian Rodriguez (Spa/XDS Astana Team) +7mins 01secs

Clément Berthet (Fra/Groupama-FDJ United) +7mins 19secs

Sepp Kuss (US/Team Visma Lease-a-bike) +8mins 55secs