Jasper Philipsen sped to his third stage win of the 2023 Tour de France alongside the river Garonne in Bordeaux on Friday afternoon, though his stage 7 victory wasn’t without controversy.
The Belgian and his Alpecin-Deceuninck team had a tense wait to see if Philipsen would be relegated after a sinuous finale on stage 3, and were in trouble three days ago on stage 4 in Nogaro as Danny van Poppel accused him of inadvertently causing Fabio Jakobsen’s late crash on the motor racing circuit. His lead-out man Mathieu van der Poel was later demoted for barging Biniam Girmay out of the way, too.
In the final metres of Friday’s stage 7 to Bordeaux, Philipsen moved across the road to jump onto Mark Cavendish’s wheel as the Manxman, chasing a record-breaking 35th Tour stage victory, hit the front.
In doing so he appeared to squeeze Biniam Girmay toward the barriers, impeding his sprint, though his win was later confirmed by the UCI jury of commissaires despite Astana Qazaqstan and Intermarché-Circus-Wanty lodging protests.
Cavendish’s Astana team boss Alexander Vinokourov lodged a complaint, though, alongside Intermarché boss Jean-François Bourlart. Speaking to Sporza after the stage, Vinokourov asked whether there has to be a crash for someone to be penalised for moving in the sprint.
“The footage clearly shows Philipsen changing direction, from left to right,” Vinokourov said. “The rules state that you have to sprint straight ahead. He hinders three riders: Dylan Groenewegen, Jordi Meeus and Biniam Girmay.
“If Girmay doesn’t brake, he ends up in the fences. Does someone have to fall to be declassified? He might have been able to win from Mark’s wheel.”
Speaking after the stage, Cavendish said that Philipsen “didn’t impede me at all so it’s not for me to discuss,” though he acknowledged that teams might protest the move.
“I’d imagine there might be a couple of teams putting protests in against Philipsen today anyway,” he said. “But he didn’t impede me so there’s nothing wrong with that. He just came from the left to the right.”
Girmay told reporters at the post-stage doping control that “nothing happened”, though his team boss Bourlart took a different tack, saying that dozens of riders could have fallen had his star not braked to avoid a collision with Philipsen or the barriers.
“Jasper wins for the third time but makes a mistake for the third time,” Bourlart said to Sporza. “Biniam is stuck against the fences again and has to brake. If he doesn’t, 50 riders will be…
Click Here to Read the Full Original Article at CyclingNews RSS Feed…