CYCLING:After five days, something approaching normality resumed on the Tour. There was a breakaway, including two Frenchmen, which failed not far from the finish; a bunch sprint without a pile-up, won by the Norwegian Thor Hushovd; and a return to La France profonde, where the warm welcome belied the autumnal chill in the air and was in contrast to the slightly pallid reception the race received in northern France on Tuesday.

Paris was an hour down the autoroute to the west for much of the stage, which ran from north to south past the capital, but the surroundings felt like rural France at its deepest and best.

Champagne vineyards and vast open cornfields gave way to dark forests of beech trees, interspersed with small villages of soft, rain-eaten stone, orchards of gnarled apple trees and, towards the end, the sumptuous medieval gatehouses at Villeneuve-sur-Yonne.

The way the Tour is welcomed into such small places never ceases to amaze. Fontaine la Gaillarde put up vast flowered posters emblazoned with recent winners' names. Bjarne Riis and Jan Ullrich may be disgraced over drugs but were included, but the villagers were taking no chances and did not include Floyd Landis.

In other little places there were bicycles bedecked with paper flowers, bikes with wheels made from giant straw bales and vast jerseys cut out of sheets.

The final kilometres alongside the river Yonne were flat and straight and should have suited Tom Boonen down to the ground, but something is not clicking with the Belgian this year and he could finish only eighth.

So the sprint fell to Hushovd, another man with a penchant for this type of simple, high-speed effort without corners, roundabouts or traffic islands to get in the way.

This was the fifth stage win of his career and it was a straightforward blast from 150 metres to go, with the South African Rob Hunter clawing his way up to within a bike length.

Swiss Fabian Cancellara, who finished safe in the main pack, retained the leader's yellow jersey. "It was a pretty cool day because the team did the job even though there was some wind," Cancellara said.

Mark Cavendish continued his apprenticeship as a Tour sprinter with 10th place, which does not sound thrilling until one remembers that he is 22 and sprinting in this elite company for the first time. Unless a fast man is as dominant as Hushovd was yesterday, or Boonen was two years ago, success depends on two things, split-second timing and space to manoeuvre, and openings are not readily given to debutants.

Cavendish was in the right place when the final sort-out started with 300 metres to go, but he was dragged across to the left of the road by riders in front of him. He seemed to hesitate for a millisecond when a space finally opened and he was swamped.

However, he did not look overawed and he remained upright. He has years of improvement ahead of him and has every chance of becoming the first Briton to win a Tour sprint since Barry Hoban in 1975 in Bordeaux, although it may not happen this year.

As far as the other Britons here are concerned, David Millar clearly retains some kind of an interest in the polka dot jersey of King of the Mountains, even though it remains on the shoulders of Stephane Auge of Cofidis. Millar took second place on the first of the day's four fourth-category climbs and remains third, just behind Auge's team-mate Sylvain Chavanel, one of the day's four unlucky escapees.

It will all seem gloriously irrelevant once the Alps are reached on Saturday.

Even today the battle for the measled vest will not be quite such a frivolous affair. A string of little climbs through the Morvan highlands tops out at almost 3,000ft on the Col du Haut-Folin, and there is another tough ascent just before the finish in Autun. It is the sort of terrain where time can be quickly gained or lost, and all eyes will be on Alexandr Vinokourov.

The Kazakhstan rider may be distracted, though. It was reported yesterday that the positive test for testosterone by his team-mate Matthias Kessler had been confirmed. Vino and his Astana team feel they are being unfairly harassed in the media and by fellow teams over the drugs issue, and the Kessler news will only make them more convinced they are victims.