Germany’s Greipel wins fifth stage

SAINT-QUENTIN, France (AP) — In yet another crash-marred finish, Andre Greipel of Germany led a frenzied bunch sprint to win the fifth stage of the Tour de France on Thursday for his second straight stage victory.

Fabian Cancellara retained the overall leader's yellow jersey for a sixth straight day after the mostly flat 122-mile trek from Rouen to Saint-Quentin — almost tailor-made for sprinters except for a slight uphill near the end.

But the Tour's doping demons returned to cast a shadow. A Dutch newspaper report said former teammates of Lance Armstrong — including five involved in this year's race — cut a deal with U.S. anti-doping officials for their testimony in a case against the seven-time Tour champion. As usual, the Tour riders tried to keep their focus on the race.

Citing “well-informed sources,” the newspaper said the U.S. Anti-Doping Agency has given six-month bans to former Armstrong teammates Jonathan Vaughters, George Hincapie, Levi Leipheimer, David Zabriskie and Christian Vande Velde.

Vaughters, now a team director at the Garmin-Sharp team, called the report “completely untrue.” The four riders all declined to comment, though Hincapie said his thoughts were with Armstrong.

“I'm sad he is going through this,” said Hincapie, the only rider to have been on all of Armstrong's Tour-winning teams.

“He's done so many things for the sport. His accomplishments are incredible.”

Cancellara said the case wasn't discussed in the pack.

“For cycling this is not good, that's for sure,” he said. "That makes me sad. But on the other hand, we have to deal with that — and I hope it's not something that is going to take three or four years like ... in other cases.

“That is my biggest concern: that this is going to shut down fast.”

Tags: sports, cycling