Stage 11: Thursday, July 15 – Sisteron to Bourg-les-Valence (184.5km)

As expected, a fairly uneventful stage, but the drama came at the end – or more accurately, afterwards.

A three-man break went off the front from the start, but was easily overhauled by the peloton 22km from home. Sensing the possibility of using the strong crosswinds to split the pack apart, yellow jersey Andy Schleck’s Saxo Bank team-mates put in a furious bout of pace-making at the front. That’s a luxury only available to a teams with riders of the calibre of Jens Voigt and Fabian Cancellara to use as ultra-domestiques.

The final kilometres were a cat-and-mouse game, with HTC-Columbia establishing a lead out train, then with Garmin-Transitions taking up the baton. Lampre were also present and looking strong, and Sky also decided to join in the fun.

The pace wound up down the bullet-straight 1km finish road. HTC-Columbia’s lead-out man extraordinaire Mark Renshaw was delivering Mark Cavendish into his traditional launch, when Renshaw and Garmin-Transitions’s Julian Deane came shoulder-to-shoulder. Renshaw clearly felt Deane was trying to muscle in on his line, and used the ’sideways head-shove’ technique to barge his way through. Dean dropped away, Cavendish launched from behind Renshaw, and headed for the line.

Renshaw then appeared to take a quick look over his left shoulder. Spotting Garmin’s Tyler Farrar trying to grab Cavendish’s wheel, Renshaw looked to deviate strongly over to the left, effectively hemming Farrar in behind him. With the barrier so close, Farrar had nowhere to go, and was forced out of contention for the stage win.

Cavendish flew over the line for the victory, ahead of Alessandro Petacchi (Lampre), with Farrar managing third.

Immediately after the stage finished, race organisers looked at footage of the closing kilometre, and adjudged that Mark Renshaw had infringed seriously in two occasions – the head-butting of Julian Deane, and the deviation from line which affected Tyler Farrar. In previous Tours, infringements like this had often been dealt with by relegating the guilty party to last place on the stage. But the race commisars clearly felt this penalty would be insufficient – Renshaw was thrown off the Tour.

The debate will undoubtedly continue for the next several days. Renshaw clearly used track-style head moves to ensure he wasn’t barged, much like a footballer attempting to get his shoulders in front of a challenger to establish his position on the ball. And watching the replays confirmed that Julian Deane did appear to be edging Renshaw towards the barriers. Perhaps a bit of standard bunch-spint argy-bargy? However, the blocking of Farrar looked deliberate and cynical. I suspect it’s this second infringement that consigned Renshaw to an early trip home.

It remains to be seen whether Mark Cavendish can continue winning stages without Renshaw there to launch him. Cav does require a launch train, unlike sprinters such as Robbie McEwen, who can thread their way through other teams’ riders to put themselves in a position to fight it out.

On the subject of sprints, the green jersey points competition is now a four-horse race. Alessandro Petacchi takes green from Thor Hushovd (Cervelo), who could only manage 7th place today. Robbie McEwen (Katusha) and Mark Cavendish are also mathematically-capable of taking the points title.

In the overall GC, no changes. Andy Schleck still wears yellow, with Alberto Contador 41 seconds back, followed by Samuel Sanchez (Euskaltel), Denis Menchov (Rabobank), and Jurgen ven den Broeck (Omega Pharma-Lotto).

King of the Mountains continues to be a scrap between Jerome Pineau (Quick Step) and Anthony Charteau (Bbox Bouyges Telecom). Pineau retains the spotted jersey by a slim 2 points.

Leader board after this stage:

Overall GC
Andy Schleck (Saxo Bank)

Points
Alessandro Petacchi (Lampre)

King of the Mountains
Jerome Pineau (Quick Step)

Young Rider
Andy Schleck (Saxo Bank)

Tomorrow’s stage is a bit of a gnarly one – 210.5km from Bourg-de-Peage to Mende, featuring three 3rd-category climbs, and two second-cats, the last one leading to a hill-top finish 1,050m up at Mende. Definitely not a day for the sprinters.