Italy's Filippo Pozzato won the seventh stage of the Tour de France held over 204.5km between Chateaubriant and Saint Brieuc, to claim his first ever stage win and give his Fassa Bortolo team their second win of this year's Tour.
Pozzatto was part of a group of seven riders in the final moments of the stage but showed maturity beyond his years to hold off the challenge of his rivals.
The Fassa Bortolo rider managed to just edge out Iker Flores of Spain in a sprint finish while Francisco Mancebo of Spain was third.
Ireland's Mark Scanlon finished among the peloton and despite being officially classed as 111th, he was just 10 seconds behind the stage winner Pozzato.
The result saw the Irishman drop just two places in the overall standings to 50th, leaving him 12:05 behind the yellow jersey of Thomas Voeckler, while his AGR2 team are now in 13th place overall.
Crashes had marred the last couple of days of the race, but today's was overshadowed by the first positive dope test, by Belgium's Christophe Brandt. The Belgian tested positive for the pain killer methadone, and was kicked out of the Tour by his Lotto-Domo team.
Filed by Rob Wright
