French sprinter Nacer Bouhanni (Cofidis) was first over the line at the end of Stage 2 of Paris-Nice today but was subsequently relegated for deviating from his line in the sprint.
Bouhanni clashed with race leader Michael Matthews (Orica-GreenEdge) in the closing metres and victory was awarded to the Australian instead.
Bouhanni was leading as they closed on the finish line at the end of the 213.5km flat stage with Matthews coming up on his left. The Cofidis rider moved to his left, closing the gap on Matthews and the pair came close to crashing.
Matthews was clearly unhappy with Bouhanni’s tactics, raising his arm in protest. The commissaires agreed with Matthews and Bouhanni was relegated to third place with Niccolo Bonifazio (Trek-Segafredo) moving up to second.
Matthews picked up 10 bonus seconds for his win, which increases his GC lead to 13 seconds over Tom Dumoulin (Giant-Alpecin).
