Mark Cavendish takes record-breaking 35th Tour de France stage win
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Mark Cavendish celebrates winning Stage 5 of the Tour de France, to break the record for the most stage wins in history.
PHOTO: REUTERS
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SAINT-VULBAS – Mark Cavendish made Tour de France history on July 3 by winning a record 35th stage at the age of 39.
Briton Cavendish beat Eddy Merckx’s mark, which had stood since 1975, on the fifth stage of the Tour near the Alps, having equalled it in 2021.
Belgian cycling great Merckx is one of just four five-time Tour champions.
Said Cavendish: “I’m in disbelief. It was a big gamble coming in trying to win. It was a big gamble for my boss trying to come to the Tour de France for this. You have to go all in. We did it.
“We worked at what we had to do. How we built the team. Every little detail. You can see what it means. It doesn’t mean we are going to be top of the UCI rankings, but the Tour de France is bigger than everything.
“The first day was bad, but it normally takes me days to get into it. I’ve done 15 Tour de Frances now. I don’t like to suffer, but you work at it and things still have to go your way.
“We didn’t nail it as a team as we wanted to do (in this stage), and the boys improvised and got me in position and I got on to whatever train I had to do.”
As the peloton swept through the lush Rhone valley with vineyards and pretty villages skirting the river, his Astana Qazaqstan team hogged the front right of the peloton as light rain fell.
A long home straight helped them form a lead-out train as the “Manx Missile” powered across the finish line well ahead of Belgian Jasper Philipsen, the 2023 sprint points green jersey winner.
The 2018 Tour winner Geraint Thomas told ITV: “To continue to do what he does at his age, 39, everyone says you get slower as you get older but he’s proved that wrong really.”
Race director Christian Prudhomme added: “Everyone has a smile today, even Eddy Merckx, of course. It’s a 15-year career, the best sprinter in the history of the Tour. He already was the best sprinter, he’s much more now.
“It’s just unbelievable. Nobody believed in him, everybody thought it was too late but him, and today he won. It’s just wonderful.”
In 2023, Cavendish left the Tour in an ambulance after a crash bamboozled his plans.
Two seasons previously, when Cavendish equalled Merckx’s stage haul in Carcassonne, it was his fourth win on that edition racing for Quick-Step after years in the wilderness suffering from the Epstein-Barr virus.
He missed out on a 35th stage on the Champs-Elysees coming third and then missed the cut for the 2022 Tour as Quick-Step picked Fabio Jakobsen, who is more than 10 years his junior.
Cavendish joined Astana in 2023 before being persuaded to sign a one-year contract extension for this season.
Two-time former winner Tadej Pogacar still leads the overall standings which he enjoyed in the yellow jersey. He is 45 seconds ahead of second-placed Remco Evenepoel, and 50sec faster than defending champion Jonas Vingegaard. AFP, REUTERS
