Lance Armstrong has narrowly failed to pull the Tour de France yellow jersey back on. The seven-time tour winner's Astana team won the 39 kilometre lap of Montpellier 40 seconds ahead of the Saxo Bank outfit led by the Swiss Fabian Cancellara, but still ended two tenths of a second short of wiping out Cancellara's lead.

Astana needed to beat Saxo Bank by more than 40 seconds to put the Texan in yellow. The difference is so slight that Armstrong and Cancellara officially have the same time.

The Rabobank team's performance was disappointing, after Denis Menchov crashed within two minutes in the course. Rabobank lost more than two minutes off the lead. Australia's Cadel Evans, the runner up in 2007 and 2008, also slipped further back and his Silence-Lotto team ended two minutes and 59 seconds behind Cancellara and Armstrong.

photo Lance Armstrong by eugene (Flickr)