Australian Mark Renshaw, the lead-out man for sprinter Mark Cavendish, has been kicked out of the Tour de France for head-butting New Zealand's Julian Dean in the finale of the 11th stage."Renshaw is out. We watched the film once and it was blatant. He head-butted Dean like in a keirin race," said Tour technical director Jean-Francois Pescheux.
"This is cycling, not fighting. Everybody could have ended up on their backs."
Renshaw helped Columbia team mate Cavendish snatch his 13th career Tour stage victory and third of this year's race in Bourg-les-Valence.
Renshaw's team believed his actions in the run up to the finish of the 184.5-km 11th stage were justified.
"There was no other solution because Renshaw had both hands on the handlebars, there was no other solution than get him away with the head otherwise everybody would have ended up in the fence," HTC-Columbia sports director Rolf Aldag said.
"Sprinting is not kindergarten, if they come by each other, shoulder against shoulder, elbow against elbow and if you can't do that you'd better do time trialling."
Cavendish added: "It's against what we as a team believe happened. I'm very sad."
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