Briton ties Merckx’s Tour de France record
CARCASSONNE, France (AP) — Mark Cavendish won a mass sprint and equalled cycling great Eddy Merckx’s all-time record of 34 stage wins at the Tour de France on Friday.
Taking part in cycling’s biggest race for the first time since 2018, the 36-year-old Cavendish has been dominating the sprints this summer. The British rider posted his fourth stage win by taking Stage 13 which finished in the southern city of Carcassonne.
Cavendish secured a new contract with his former Deceuninck Quick Step team for this year after returning from a bout of depression and several seasons of struggles on and off the bike. But he was not expected to ride in the Tour and did not train specifically for the three-week race. He was a late call-up last month as a replacement for Sam Bennett, the best sprinter of last year’s Tour.
Cavendish has never won the Tour de
France. Merckx won it five times.
Known as “The Manx Missile” as he comes from the Isle of Man, Cavendish jostled for position in the last two kilometres to stay on the wheel of lead-out man Michael Morkov. He looked trapped in traffic with 300 metres left but zigzagged to the front and comfortably won ahead of Morkov. Jasper Philipsen was third.
“I can't even think about (the record). I’m afraid I’m so dead after 220 kilometres in that heat, that wind and that finale,” Cavendish said. “I went deep, I went so deep there. The boys were incredible. I can’t believe it. A lot of the day it didn’t feel like it, but it had to happen because I had the guys riding like they were. I was so on the limit there.”
There was no significant change in the general classification as race leader Tadej Pogacar enjoyed a quiet day in the peloton. Pogacar kept his 5:18 lead over second-placed
Rigoberto Uran, with Jonas Vingegaard in third, 5:33 off the pace.
The race started with a flurry of attacks in the early stages of the 220-km trek in southern France. But Cavendish’s teammates set a fast tempo at the front to prevent large group of riders from breaking away, determined to ensure a mass sprint in the end.
In the shadow of large plane trees through the Languedoc vineyards, the leading trio was reduced to a pair when Pierre Latour and Omer Goldstein dropped Sean Bennett. They were reined in with 50 km left after a crash involving dozens of riders briefly split the peloton.
Frenchman Quentin Pacher launched an illfated solo effort to build a lead of more than a minute before Cavendish’s Deceuninck Quick Step riders dramatically sped up the pace to swallow him about 19 kilometers from the finish.