Cuneo (Italy) (AFP) - Frenchman Arnaud Demare won a third mass sprint for the line on the Giro d'Italia on Friday as a breathless pursuit from the peloton caught an escape group just ahead of the home straight on stage 13.
Demare narrowly edged a surging Phil Bauhaus as Mark Cavendish faded at the line after the Briton's Quick-Step team had led a cavalry charge to catch the escapees.
Spaniard Juan Pedro Lopez continued his run in the leader's pink jersey.
On a short 150km ride, only half the distance of the Milan-San Remo one-day classic, four riders opened a six-minute gap they nursed until the final 500m, setting up a frantic sprint.
"At one point I doubted we would catch them (the escape)," said Demare after this third win extended his lead in the sprint points race.
"It was a monstrous lead-out," said the winner after outlasting Cavendish in a long shoulder-to-shoulder struggle that was only resolved at the finish line.
The 30-year-old FDJ man also won consecutive sprint finishes in the first week, leaving him on 238pts, while Cavendish is second on 121.
Cavendish in mix
Cavendish turns 37 on Sunday and has one more opportunity to win a sprint on stage 18 if he continues racing.
A potential Tour de France slot beckons for him however after a stage win and two podium spots so far.
The long chase of the escape to ensure a sprint finish possibly slowed Cavendish over the finale Friday.
"We had to get over the climb, to chase the breakaway, which had a good gap," he explained, adding his teammates had gone beyond what was expected of them.
"I gave everything I had and did the best sprint I could.I'm proud of the boys and their amazing work today."
This was his 23rd podium finish at the Giro where he has won 16 stages overall despite a nine-year absence before this edition.
It was a bad day for French climber Romain Bardet, who pulled out complaining of feeling sick and clutching his stomach.
The 31-year-old DSM man was fourth in the standings heading into the mountainous final week where he would likely have thrived, given his form when winning the Tour of the Alps in April.
"I had nothing left in me," said Bardet."I'm deeply disappointed to leave the race like that."
Along with Ineos leader Richard Carapaz and Bahrain Victorious' Mikel Landa, Bardet was shaping up as a credible pretender to win this Giro.
Instead he joins Simon Yates and Tom Dumoulin on the list of pre-race favourites to have fallen foul of one of the many hazards along the epic three week route.
More victims could follow on what an Ineos Grenadiers tweet described as "a key GC weekend" with the Giro shakedown primed to continue in the tough stages ahead.
Leader Lopez will do well to survive in pink any further with Team UAE's Joao Almeida and Carapaz at 12sec adrift in the overall, with a clutch of others lurking within a minute of the lead.
"Some guys will try to make a difference but I will do 100 percent and we'll see what happens," Lopez said after the race.
Saturday's treacherous hilly stage should shake up the standings, while Sunday's mountain climb is a slog to a summit finish at over 1500m at Cogne in the Aosta Valley north of Turin.
