Australia's Stuart O'Grady has won the Tour de France fifth stage held over 200.5km between Amiens and Chartes to take his first Tour stage for his new Cofidis team.

O'Grady was part of a five-man breakaway which formed at the 16km mark and went on to build a 17-minute lead on the peloton, being led by Lance Armstrong's US Postal team, before finishing in a time of 5hr 5min.

O'Grady held off Dane Jakob Piil of the CSC team in a two-man sprint for the line after a game of cat and mouse between the stage leaders.

Frenchman Sandy Casar, of the Fdjeux.com team, came third to pull on the white jersey for the race's best under-25 rider which should have been won by Thomas Voeckler.

Recently-crowned French champion Voeckler, who rides for La Boulangere, instead pulled on a more prestigious tunic in the yellow jersey.

Voeckler, who is from the French Caribbean island of Martinique, started the day's stage only three minutes behind overnight leader Lance Armstrong who crossed the line with the rest of the rain-soaked peloton about 12 and a half minutes back.

The 32-year-old American five-time winner had taken the race lead following US Postal's domination of yesterday's team time trial, after which Armstrong said they would not be defending the race lead in the coming days.

A number of crashes occurred during the mainly flat stage, claiming Liberty climber Roberto Heras, Dutchman Michael Boogerd and up to three US Postal riders, including Manuel Beltran near the halfway mark.

Further on Phonak's Jose Enrique Gutierrez, who started the stage in sixth place overall, also came down alongside Frenchman Ludovic Martin of the RAGT team.

The biggest victim of the race however was Bradley McGee, the leader of the Fdjeux.com team who won last year's prologue.

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