Giro win for Cavendish after nine-year absence

Mark Cavendish ensured a winning return to the Giro d’italia as he sprinted to victory on stage three in Hungary.

In the 36-year-old’s first appearance at the grand tour since 2013, he powered to the front with around 300 metres remaining and held off Arnaud Demare and Fernando Gaviria to take victory in Balatonfured. It was the Quick-step Alpha Vinyl rider’s 16th victory at the Giro d’italia and 160th of his professional career, and he was ecstatic to finish off his team’s hard work on the 201km race from Kaposvar.

He said in his post-race TV interview: “I’m very happy. It’s nice to win. I wanted to do good in the first sprint.

“We have half of the team for climbing and half of the team for the sprints here. My teammates rode incredibly well.

“We had a set up and they delivered. I had to go long at 300m. I’m happy it worked well.”

Quickstep’s pre-eminent lead-out man Michael Mørkøv piloted Cavendish in the finishing straight after long stints from Davide Ballerini and Bert Van Lerberghe. “When you have guys like this, it leaves me full of confidence because I know it’s on me.

“I’ve got the best group of guys around me. I know I’ve not got any excuses,” said Cavendish. “I haven’t had a full team this year yet like Fabio [Jakobsen], so it’s nice to get it here for the Giro.”

There was no change at the top of the grand classification, with Dutch rider Mathieu van der Poel maintaining his 11-second lead over Britain’s Simon Yates, who won stage two.

The riders will fly to Sicily for tomorrow’s fourth stage after the 2022 edition started with three days in Hungary.*