James Coyne

Mark CAVENDISH continued to enhance his reputation as cycling's new sprint king with a fourth stage win in the 2008 Tour de France.

Cavendish emerged to the left of veteran sprinter Robbie McEwen to become only the second British rider to win back-to-back stages in a Grand Tour with victory in stage 13 from Narbonne to Nimes.

The quick run-in to Nimes was again perfect for the sprinters, and the old guard of Erik Zabel, Thor Hushovd and McEwen once again had no answer to Cavendish's speed in the final 100 metres.

After his fourth success of the Tour, Cavendish said: "I was trying that hard, so to get another win was really good.

"It's a bit impossible to comprehend but now I'd see it as a failure to not carry on winning."

Cavendish added: "I only planned to do 10 days of the Giro de Paris but finished it and now I'm 13 days into the Tour not feeling too tired. I'll take every day as it comes and see how far I can get."

Australia's Cadel Evans retained the leader's yellow jersey, one second ahead of Frank Schleck of Luxembourg.

Cavendish's powers of recovery are renowned, but even he was expected to struggle after the exertions of Thursday, when he won another bunch sprint into Narbonne.

Once again, Cavendish's route seemed to be blocked, this time by Hushovd and Mark Renshaw. Milram had also given Zabel an ideal benchmark entering the final kilometre, but Cavendish's timing to pop out from behind Hushovd was again impeccable.

The 23-year-old is only the second sprinter in the last 10 years to win four stages in the same Tour de France, the other being Alessandro Petacchi in 2003.

It remains unclear if the Manxman will stay in the Tour through the Alps, in order to challenge for a fifth win on the Champs-Elysees, or whether he will be withdrawn to prepare for the Beijing Olympics.

Oscar Freire, who finished fifth in the stage, holds onto the lead in the points competition by 28 points from Cavendish and Hushovd.

Midway through the stage, it emerged Riccardo Ricco had been sacked by Saunier Duval-Scott, along with team-mate and fellow Italian Leonardo Piepoli.

Ricco, 24, returned a positive test for CERA, a third-generation version of the blood-booster EPO, for the Cholet time-trial. Piepoli, 36, was dismissed for a "violation of the team's ethics code."

Results & Standings Tour de France, Stage 13 (Narbonne - Nimes, 182km) 1 M Cavendish (GB) Team Columbia 4hr 25min 42sec, 2 R McEwen (Aus) Silence - Lotto at same time, 3 R Feillu (Fra) Agritubel at same time, 4 H Haussler (Ger) Gerolsteiner at same time, 5 O F Gomez (Spa) Rabobank at same time, 6 T Hushovd (Nor) Credit Agricole at same time, 7 L Duque (Col) Cofidis - Le Credit par Telephone at same time, 8 E Zabel (Ger) Team Milram at same time, 9 J Dean (Nzl) Team Garmin-Chipotle p/b H30 at same time, 10 S Chavanel (Fra) Francaise des Jeux at same time, 11 R Hunter (SA) Barloworld at same time, 12 G Steegmans (Bel) Quick Step at same time, 13 Ii I Flores (Spa) Euskaltel - Euskadi at same time, 14 A Coyot (Fra) Caisse d'Epargne at same time, 15 R Perez Moreno (Spa) Euskaltel - Euskadi at same time, 16 X Florencio Cabre (Spa) Bouygues Telecom at same time, 17 M Maaskant (Ned) Team Garmin-Chipotle p/b H30 at same time, 18 A Ballan (Ita) Lampre at same time, 19 R Forster (Ger) Gerolsteiner at same time, 20 J Casper (Fra) Agritubel at same time Other. 22 D Millar (GB) Team Garmin-Chipotle p/b H30 4hr 25min 42sec General classification after Stage 13 1 C Evans (Aus) 54hr 48min 47sec, 2 F Schleck (Lux) at 0.01, 3 C Vande Velde (US) at 0.38, 4 B Kohl (Aut) at 0.46, 5 D Menchov (Rus) at 0.57, 6 C Sastre Candil (Spa) at 1.28, 7 K Kirchen (Lux) at 1.56, 8 V Efimkin (Rus) at 2.32, 9 M Astarloza Chaurreau (Spa) at 3.51, 10 V Nibali (Ita) at 4.18, 11 S Sanchez Gonzalez (Spa) at 4.26, 12 A Valverde Belmonte (Spa) at 4.41, 13 T Valjavec (Slo) at 5.23, 14 D Cunego (Ita) at 5.37, 15 O Pereiro Sio (Spa) at 6.01, 16 A Botcharov (Rus) at 6.07, 17 S Schumacher (Ger) at 6.26, 18 M Monfort (Bel) at 7.07, 19 R Kreuziger (Cze) Liquigas at 7.11, 20 A Schleck (Lux) at 8.45 Others. 47 D Millar 55hr 24min 09sec, 144 M Cavendish 56:40:51