Stage 4 - Petacchi Doubles Up

Alessandro Pettachi won his second stage at this years Tour after the race finally returned to normalcy after a hectic three days. Stage 4, a 153km journey from Cambrai to Reims ended in a regulation sprint finish with no change to the overall classification after the majority of the peleton finished together.

The big talking point of the day is the relative sprinting form of Pettachi, who took his second stage win from two genuine sprint finishes, and pre-Tour Green Jersey favourite Mark Cavendish. Cavendish looked to be in prime position to unleash one of his famous finishing bursts with a kilometre to go, but he faded badly in the straight and could only finish 12th on the day. Instead, it was Pettachi who again burst clear of the pack to charge to another victory, and in doing so move within 10 points of Thor Hushovd (9th) in the race for the Green Jersey. New Zealander Julian Dean was second on the stage, while Sky sprinter Edvald Boasson Hagen finished third.

The form of Cavendish will definatley be of concern for HTC Columbia after the squad did almost all the work in brining the days break to the peleton, before setting up Cavendish in the closing kilometeres for a sprint victory. With a similar stage on the cards tonight, it will pay to give Cavendish one more chance at glory, but another poor perofmance may mean it is time for HTC to refocus their attentions - perhaps towards helping Michael Rogers into a top 10 spot in the General Classification.

With only one category four climb on the day there was no change to the KOM classification, with Jerome Pineau reamining in the Polka Dot Jersey. And with the Peleton finishing the stage together Fabian Cancellara and Geraint Thomas held on to their Yellow and White Jersey's respectively.

Yellow Jersey - Fabian Cancellara
Green Jersey - Thor Hushovd
Polka Dot Jersey - Jerome Pinault
White Jersey - Geraint Thomas

Tonight's Stage - Stage 5 is a similarly flat affair over 185km between Epernay and Montargis. The win is likely to be decided in the domain of the sprinters again, and with Cavendish looking hopelessly out of form it is hard to go past Alessandro Pettachi for a third stage win in just 6 days.