Tuesday, 4 July 2017

Tour de France: Demare wins in Vittel

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Arnaud Démare (FDJ) won a hectic sprint into Vittel to take his first win at the Tour de France, but his success was overshadowed by a high-speed crash in the finishing straight that left Mark Cavendish (Dimension Data) on the ground and saw Peter Sagan (Bora-Hansgrohe) disqualified from the race for sparking the crash.

Démare was ahead of the carnage in a select group of sprinters that had avoided a crash with a kilometre to go that involved race leader Geraint Thomas (Team Sky) and several others. He came past French rival Nacer Bouhanni (Cofidis) along the barriers and then cut to the centre of the road to beat Alexander Kristoff (Katusha-Alpecin) at the line.

Behind him riders fought for his wheel. Cavendish was there but Sagan moved to the barriers to follow the Démare, not seeing or not caring that Cavendish was coming up fast. It was a risky move by the Manxman to try to follow Démare but his only other option was to brake and lose any chance in the sprint. He chose to take a risk but as the sprinters rippled towards the barriers, his way through was closed. Cavendish tried to stay upwards but lost his balance and hit the barriers at speed.

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Sagan made matters worse by sticking out his elbow as he tried to stay up. Behind them, John Degenkolb (Trek-Segafredo) and Ben Swift (UAE TeamEmirates) had nowhere to go and flew over the top of Cavendish, who was already lying on the ground.

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Cavendish got up but had suffered multiple injuries, including to the shoulder he injured in the 2014 Tour de France sprint crash in Harrogate, and a cut to a finger.

Late drama

You can read more at Cyclingnews.com



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