Tour de Biff: Mark Renshaw Thrown off the Tour for Headbutting

A bunch sprint at the end of a Tour stage is no place for the faint hearted.

Often travelling in excess of 60km/h, timid riders not only get swallowed up, but become dangerous to those around them. Sprinters are not timid riders.

Body contact between them is expected; leaning on each other is commonplace. Occasionally, it all gets out of hand.

When you are exerting that much energy, there is not sufficient oxygen to hold a conversation. An elbow, or gentle caress with the helmet, is a sprinte'rs way of saying, “excuse me, you appear to be encroaching on my personal space” or words to that effect.

Such was the case in the sprint to the finish of the eleventh stage of this year’s Tour de France.

Mark Renshaw and Julian Dean, the lead-out men for Mark Cavendish and Tyler Farrar respectively, were involved in an incident as they tried to position their riders for the final sprint to the line.

Garmin-Transitions rider Dean appeared to try to force HTC’s Renshaw towards the barriers, by continually moving across on Renshaw. That tactic was designed not only to slow Renshaw down to avoid a crash, but also blocked the way for Cavendish to come through to finish the sprint.

Renshaw responded by leaning back on Dean but also threw three headbutts at him as well. It is that action that attracted the attention of the referees and has resulted in Renshaw being ousted from the Tour.

Interestingly, once Cavendish had been released, Renshaw then blocked Farrar’s run to the finish line by moving across his line toward the barriers. This is usually seen as a much more serious offence and may have also influenced the referee’s decision to exclude Renshaw.

Dean’s actions appear to have gone on unchallenged and he went on to proclaim his innocence by stating that he didn’t move across on Renshaw. The video evidence shows otherwise.

Strangely, this is not the first incidence of “violence” in this year’s tour.

Garmin-Transitions’ Robbie Hunter punched Saxo Bank’s Jakob Fugslang on the cobbled roads of stage three. Hunter maintains that it was in retaliation as he claims that Fugslang threw the first punch.

Both of the incidents, however, pale in comparison to the extraordinary, and somewhat embarrassing, scuffle that broke out between Caisse D’Espargne’s Rui Costa and Quickstep’s Carlos Barredo at the conclusion of the Tour’s sixth stage.

Barredo was apparently outraged that Costa had elbowed him with about 20km to go and confronted Costa and hit him with a front wheel after the pair crossed the finish line.

In the ensuing scuffle, little more than pride was damaged, but the pair were fined 400 Swiss Francs for “insults, threats and incorrect behavior.”

Neither rider, however, was expelled from the Tour, showing us that cycling is no different than any other sport for inconsistent application of its rules.

The loss of Renshaw will be a massive blow to Cavendish, for whom Renshaw has been an integral part of his success.

Widely regarded as one of the best lead-out men in the world, Renshaw put Cavendish into position to release his explosive pace and the combination has proven to be almost unbeatable.

It will be interesting to see if HTC can find someone on the team to take Renshaw’s place.

If not, Cavendish’s dream of a green jersey in 2010 has evaporated.