Mark Cavendish talks World Championship defeat and more Tour de France success
Thursday 29 December 2016 08:19, UK
Defeat in the World Road Race Championship rankles with Mark Cavendish despite another hugely successful season on the roads and track.
Cavendish bounced back from a below-par second half of 2015 to win four more stages at the Tour de France, taking his career tally to 30, claim overall success in the Tour of Qatar, win madison gold alongside Sir Bradley Wiggins at the World Track Championships and secure a silver medal in the multi-event omnium at the Olympic Games in Rio.
But it was one of his narrow defeats, when edged out by defending champion Peter Sagan in Qatar in October, that the sprinting great reflects on with a tinge of disappointment.
The course in Doha appeared to be ideal for Cavendish who, at 31, remains one of the fastest sprinters in the world and that kind of chance is unlikely to come around for a number of years.
"I am happy with how the year has gone but ultimately I like winning," Cavendish said.
"I gave everything in the Olympics and ultimately the best I came up with was silver. I'm happy with that as I couldn't have done better.
"The worlds, any other time I ride that race I do the exact same tactics and I win it.
"I should have won. It was a great champion who won it, so I can't be upset with that, but it was kind of hard and I like winning. Even if I win I will probably find something I could work on or something to criticise and get better next time.
"It's not a season I want to replicate soon in terms of how hard I worked, and the sacrifices I put into it, but I definitely I gave my all and came out on top, if not second place."
Among the undoubted highlights for Cavendish, who has just completed his first season with Team Dimension Data, was pulling on the Tour de France's legendary yellow jersey for the first time.
The chance to do so was afforded to Cavendish in Normandy when the race was opened with a flat stage, not the normal prologue or time-trial, and he took full advantage with a victory over German sprint ace Marcel Kittel and now dual world champion Sagan.
He said: "Getting the yellow jersey at the first stage of the Tour was something I'd never done. It was something missing that I'd tried for and not got.
"My family was there. Peta was there with the kids and it was close to home in northern France and things worked right.
"When I think of everything that day, it was pretty special for me. I hadn't really reflected on it until last week as I was still racing and still had aims. I definitely look back and I smile now when I think of it."
Cavendish intends to target the race again in 2017 and promises "fireworks" on the sprint days and, because of the testing route, more of the same when the big climbing names come to the fore in the mountains.
He added: "The Tour is quite good for 2017 as it has gone back to how it was in the past.
"You've got flat days or mountains days. You've not really got those medium days that tire people out but don't have effect on the race.
"They reckon nine flat days but more realistically it's like seven or eight, which is more than we've had previously and really whets your appetite for being in best condition possible for July.
"I love the Tour. I've built my whole career on it. I've built my whole season round every July and I want to go back and prove the success Dimension Data have had this year wasn't a fluke and that we mean business in July."
Those flat stages in July will give Cavendish the chance to close on Eddy Merckx, the Belgian great who owns the record for Tour de France stage wins.
Cavendish sits four behind Merckx's record of 34 stage victories, but the Briton says he will never be able to match "the greatest cyclist that has ever been" when his five overall Tour de France wins are factored in.
He added: "I will never put my name in the same sentence of Eddy Merckx. I'm never going to do that.
"The Tour de France is the Tour de France. One stage win can make a whole rider's career, never mind one per year.
"Eddy Merckx is the greatest cyclist that has ever been so there's a reason he is top of table with stage wins.
"I actually never ever said I was aiming for that amount of wins. It was more the context which was put in by British press when they were still trying to understand cycling and how it fit in this country. As I gained more stage wins, it gained more momentum.
"I'm fortunate to start the Tour de France, I will show the race the respect it deserves and will try my best and see what comes. If I'm only good enough to win one more stage in my career, then so be it. If I win 20 more stages, then so be it. I just go with my team and try my best to do what I can."
