Cavendish loses Tour points

The 24-year-old Team Columbia rider led home the peloton in 13th place but had his green jersey points taken away by the race jury, who deemed he pushed Hushovd too close to the barriers.

The Norwegian was therefore given the 13 points and Cavendish, who was relegated to the back of the bunch, now trails by 18 points.

Rinaldo Nocentini kept hold of the yellow jersey by the skin of his teeth after George Hincapie's brave attempt to oust the Italian from the top of the general classification came up just short.

Team Columbia's Hincapie was part of a 12-man breakaway group that dominated the 14th stage - a trek of 199 kilometres from Colmar to Besancon - and he finished eighth behind the winner, Katusha's Sergei Ivanov.

It looked at one point that Nocentini, who stayed in the peloton all day, was going to relinquish the maillot jaune but his AG2R team pulled out all the stops in the final few kilometres to keep their man top of the standings.

Nocentini now sits five seconds ahead of Hincapie, who is second having bumped Astana duo Alberto Contador and Lance Armstrong down a place.

Frenchman Christophe Le Mevel, who was part of the breakaway group, moves into fifth place overall, just behind Armstrong.

Ireland's Nicolas Roche finished runner-up in the stage, 16 seconds behind Ivanov, with Hayden Roulston in third.