George should have been in Yellow!

Hincapie now in 2nd, he missed yellow by 5 seconds.

Sergei Ivanov took stage 14 by attacking his 12 breakaway companions with 11km remaining in the stage. A stage winner in 2001 Ivanov watched as 3 or 4 other attacks off the front of the breakaway failed before he tried and succeeded. He rode solo to the line finishing 16 seconds ahead of Roche and Roulston.

George Hincapie was the virtual wearer of the Yellow Jersey for most of the day, he crossed the line in that group 16 seconds behind the winner - and he then had a nervous wait with the peleton at almost 6 minutes behind. Starting the day 5 minutes and 25 seconds out of Yellow, he needed the peleton to cross the line 5 minutes 41 behind the winner - they crossed in 5.36 meaning he missed yellow by 5 seconds.

The interesting thing was what unfolded over those final kilometers, AG2R were on the front of the bunch working hard to keep their man Nocentini in the lead, rival american squad Garmin-Slipstream came to the front though and worked hard to help them - this created some tension post race! Columbia thought that the tactics were a deliberate attempt to keep Hincapie out of Yellow - they had no other motivation.

Then as Columbia HTC came to the front looking for maximum sprint points for Cavendish (and unfortunately helping the pace along) they spread across the road in the sprint and in the wash up Mark Cavendish was disqualified from the sprint (which he won easily) for irregular riding, it did look pretty irregular he cut hushovd off and was veering all over the road looking over his shoulder. So hushovd got 13th spot and the green jersey points that go with it, Cav got relegated to the back of the pack and got none. Hushovd leads the Green by 18 points and it is going to take everything in Cavendish's power to win back the Green. He would probably have to win the last 2 remaining sprint stages and even then, if hushovd finished second in each he would be 8 points behind. He is going to have to win intermediates as well as hope for some luck.

So a bad day all around for Columbia.

And a great day for Katusha who came to the tour without their main man, Robbie McEwen.