“Everyone is doing everything they can: we’re all going to altitude, all riding fast bikes, all getting aero testing, all fuelling well, so it’s not that he works harder than us – there is no way – but he’s got better genes. It’s as simple as that,” said Bennett.
Stage 1 of the Volta a Catalunya served up a thrilling finish as Nicholas Schultz (Israel-Premier Tech) held off a sprinting Tadej Pogacar (UAE Team Emirates) to claim victory. Schultz looked like he was going to be caught after making a solo attack on an uphill finish, but he found the energy to just cross the line ahead of Pogacar, who was coming up fast.
Tadej Pogacar has said that UAE Team Emirates “had a plan and stuck to it” at Milano-Sanremo, and “they couldn’t do much better” than his third-placed finish.
Jasper Philipsen (Alpecin-Deceuninck) won the race with a fantastic sprint finish in Sanremo, where the Belgian left Pogacar in his wake, after assistance from last year’s winner and his team-mate Mathieu van der Poel, who finished 10th.
Michael Matthews (Team Jayco AlUla) took second spot. It was the third time on the podium for Matthews, his first second place, from 11 appearances across a 15-year cycling career.
Pogacar did, however, show excellent resilience on his own in the final stretch, outlasting Lidl-Trek’s elite sprinters Mads Pedersen and Jasper Stuyven in the final kilometres.
“We had a plan and stuck to it,” Pogacar told Eurosport after the race.
“We missed little bits – maybe 10% – on Cipressa and after. The team had to wait too long on the Poggio, so it wasn’t too hard, and I tried to attack twice.
“I had incredible legs, but this year was not hard enough to be a climber’s race. I did everything I could to get third place. In this situation, I couldn’t have done much better. It was close.
“Today was one of the easiest races ever. We rode at a super easy tempo in the first few hours, but everything needed to be perfect, and today everything was not perfect.
“We did really good and I think the podium was the [best] we could do.”
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‘Crazy end to the race’ – Philipsen seals stunning victory at Milano-Sanremo
Eurosport expert Adam Blythe has said that UAE Team Emirates’ Milano-Sanremo plan “failed massively” after Tadej Pogacar finished third on the Italian west coast.
Pogacar, however, was left alone on the Poggio di Sanremo, as the Slovenian finished as the only UAE rider in the top 10.
Speaking on the Breakaway show on Eurosport after the race, Blythe, winner of the National Championships road race in 2016, said that UAE’s plan had “failed massively”, with fellow Eurosport expert Dan Lloyd saying that Pogacar would be “very frustrated” afterwards.
“I think the plan failed massively,” Blythe said.
“With a tailwind coming into the coast on the Poggio, [an earlier Pogacar attack] would have been suicidal,” added Blythe when he was asked whether Pogacar should have launched a long-range solo attack. “They started way too early on the Capi, going too hard early on and using up a lot of riders. [They were] ill-positioned massively coming into the Cipressa.
“Pogacar did what he set out to do. He attacked on the Poggio as he said he would, did it twice, created a small gap and then got it back when it all came back together. That guy beat some of the best sprinters in the world. He beat [Mads] Pedersen and [Jasper] Stuyven in the sprint. The guys he beat – third place is the best-possible outcome for him.”
Lloyd agreed, and believed that Pogacar would cut a frustrated figure afterwards. He also questioned the team’s tactics.
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‘I’m here to win today’ – Pedersen feeling confident ahead of Milano-Sanremo
“They kept with the plan they had,” Lloyd said. “Where was Diego Ulissi? There were a couple of riders on the scene like Marc Hirschi who was loitering but never actually did a job on the front, and that’s what I feel like they were missing.
“They did go hard on the Tre Capi, and you could see the riders suffering there, but they’d already used [Domen] Novak there. They’d used [Alessandro] Covi as well. It meant that Tim Wellens was already being asked to go on the Cipressa. The plan would have been not to use [him] on the Cipressa, to save him for the Poggio to ramp it up there.
“That’s why the Poggio wasn’t raced super hard because every other team was looking at them knowing what [they] want[ed] to do, and it was up to them to do it. They didn’t have the numbers left to do it.
“Behind the scenes, Pogacar is going to be very frustrated. That’s the first time he’s got separation on the Poggio from anybody else. This year, he had amazing legs. He had to leave it close to the finale to make his move.”
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Strade Bianche highlights: Pogacar destroys everyone with wild solo attack
Visma-Lease a Bike’s Jonas Vingegaard scored a comfortable overall victory at Tirreno-Adriatico, with Lidl-Trek rider Jonathan Milan winning Sunday’s final stage.
The San Benedetto del Tronto stage looked to suit sprinters and so it proved as the 154km route was claimed by Milan.
Soren Wærenskjold, Alexander Kristoff (both Uno-X) and Davide Cimolai (Movistar) were all in the frame for victory but were unable to match Milan’s pace as he secured the win.
“Your last win is always the most special but this one is,” Milan said after the race after overhauling Wærenskjold.
“It was a hard and tough day. It was a high pace all day. It was impressive the work the guys did for me and so I wanted to finish this race with another win.
“It was really tough to catch the Uno-X rider in the last kilometre. For a moment I thought he’d make it to the finish but my teammate Simone Consonni did a fantastic leadout for me. It was impressive.
“We knew the beginning of the stage would be hard and we didn’t want the break to get a big gap. There were super strong riders up the road and so we had to push a lot. That made for the super high speed.”
Vingegaard was in a comfortable position from the start having won the fifth stage in the Apennines and Stage 6 at Le Marche, so rode with little concern in the peloton.
He said: “In the end it was a very hard day but luckily we were able to keep this beautiful jersey, and once again the team kept me out of trouble.
“It’s one of the most iconic ones [trophies] in cycling, and I’m very happy to have it at home now.
“It’s one of the biggest victories I have, for sure. I’m very, very happy to have taken the overall victory. I will enjoy it for sure.”
He ended 1’24” clear of second-placed Juan Ayuso (UAE Team Emirates), and Bora-Hansgrohe’s Jai Hindley was third at 1’52” back.
The Manx Missile held off Arnaud Demare (Groupama-FDJ) and Fernando Gaviria (UAE Team Emirates) – who finished second and third respectively – after a 201km ride from Kaposvar to Balatonfured.
Cavendish’s participation at the Giro has largely been seen as a signal that the 36-year-old will not be making a 14th appearance at the Tour de France. However, an impressive showing in Italy could see Cavendish emerge as Quick-Step’s pre-eminent sprinter and force team manager Patrick Lefevere to reassess his plan for the Tour, which – the consensus states – currently has Fabio Jakobsen as Quick-Step’s lead sprinter.
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Could and will are two different things.
However, there are – or were – seven stages at the 2022 Giro d’Italia that will more than likely culminate in sprint finishes. Two – the first and third – have already come and gone. Therefore, Cavendish has five opportunities to add to his haul.
Stages 5, 6, 11, 13 and 18 represent opportunities – to varying degrees – for sprinters to add to their palmares. Here are the stage profiles:
Stage 5 | Catania – Messina (174km)
The second of the Giro’s two stages in Sicily could culminate in a sprint. The Portella Mandrazzi – situated 75km into the 174km ride – presents an opportunity for a breakaway win. However, should Cavendish, Caleb Ewan (Lotto–Soudal) et al get across with the main bunch then this stage will likely finish in a bunch sprint.
Stage 6 | Palmi – Scalea (192km)
Stage 11 | Santarcangelo di Romagna – Reggio Emilia (203km)
Pan-flat with just 480m of elevation over 203km and a 350m-long home straight on a seven-metre-wide tarmacked road. A nailed-on bunch sprint.
Stage 13 | Sanremo – Cuneo (150km)
Stage 18 | Borgo Valsugana – Treviso (152km)
The final sprint opportunity of the 2022 race is reward for those sprinters who braved an arduous few days in the mountains that preceded it. But who will be left to contest it? More on that below.
‘So controlled’ – A breakdown of Mark Cavendish’s breathtaking Stage 3 win
Now that the opportunities have been presented, who are the main threats to Cavendish’s hopes?
Ewan has five stage wins to his name at the Giro, and is the fastest man at the race. He finished eighth on Stage 3 and has won five stages previously at the Giro, in 2017, 2019 and 2021. The Australian is a notorious slow starter at Grand Tours, claiming just one of his 11 wins before the fifth stage. He has only finished two of his eight Grand Tours, though, and has never completed a Giro. Cavendish, for context, has finished three of his five Giros, and 11 of the 20 Grand Tours he has started. So, should he make it to Stage 18, Cavendish may count himself as out-right favourite for the win.
There, however, are other threats within the peloton to Cavendish’s hopes of adding to his 16 Giro stage wins. Demare – winner of the ciclamino in 2020 – and Gaviria (UAE Team Emirates), who won it in 2017, are the other ‘pure’ sprinters in the field. Demare and Gaviria both have five stage wins to their name, winning four of those at the 2020 and 2017 race respectively. Both Demare and Gaviria have finished two of their four trips to the Giro.
Israel Premier Tech’s Giacomo Nizzolo, who collected back-to-back red jerseys in the pre-ciclamino days of 2015 and 2016, was also on the start list, but has only ever won one Giro stage: Stage 13 of the 2021 race.
Other riders capable of stage wins at this year’s race include Magnus Cort (EF Education-EasyPost), Diego Ulissi (UAE Team Emirates), Mathieu van der Poel (Alpecin-Fenix), Biniam Girmay (Intermarche-Wanty-Gobert) and Cees Bol (Team DSM).
So…
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Mark Cavendish is riding the Giro d’Italia because his team are not planning to take him to the Tour de France. Correction, they are not currently planning to take him to the Tour de France.
Because while Fabio Jakobsen might be the first-string sprinter in the eyes of Quick-Step Alpha Vinyl management, that is not a status carved in stone tablet. It is at best an entry in a cell of a spreadsheet, as erasable as these words here.
And while Cavendish heads to Sicily to continue racing against (and beating) the very best sprinters in the world, on primetime TV, Jakobsen will this week be riding the second-string race that is the Tour de Hongrie, against the likes of Elia Viviani (Ineos Grenadiers) Jon Aberasturi (Trek Segafredo) and Olav Kooij (Jumbo Visma). Dylan Groenewegen (Team BikeExchange-Jayco) too, of course, but the Dutchman has not taken a WorldTour victory in more than two years.
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Lest we imagine otherwise, when it comes to his team selections, as well as the contracts he negotiates with his employees, Patrick Lefevere is not known for being a sentimental. That is the most straightforward explanation for why his teams have always won as much and as consistently as they have.
That, in turn is why he has maintained such a strong grip over the sporting direction of the Belgian outfit.
Cavendish’s success at the Tour last year was astonishing but it was not entirely possible to accurately measure the magnitude of his performances.
‘It’s number 16!’ – Mark Cavendish wins Stage 3 of the Giro
Any rider can only beat those others who show up, but it could be argued that, in no small part due to Caleb Ewan’s stage four crash, as well as a few other lucky breaks, he was not in a position to prove himself against the very best sprinters sprinting at their very best. From what Lefevere has seen of them both, it could be argued that there would be greater risk associated with taking Cavendish to the Tour de France this year, than Jakobsen.
In contrast Jakobsen could destroy the competition at the 2.1 rated Hungarian Tour, taking three or even four stages, and yet still see his star decline, relative to that of Cavendish.
It may not be enough to see him slip from the team’s No. 1 spot, but it could be sufficient to increase the pressure, or even make it a coin-flip between the pair.
‘He’s proven he can go’ – Breakaway team back Cavendish for Tour de France selection
There is, undoubtedly, a heavy dose of Anglo-centric wishful thinking associated with this take. There is even more embedded when Robbie McEwen and Adam Blythe say similar, the latter being a close friend of Cavendish. None of us have anything against Jakobsen, who has a very special story of his own. We simply want to see Cavendish make it 35 Tour wins. We want him to make history. Again.
It is astonishing that it is still possible he could.
– – –
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Mark Cavendish is riding the Giro d’Italia because his team are not planning to take him to the Tour de France. Correction, they are not currently planning to take him to the Tour de France.
Because while Fabio Jakobsen might be the first-string sprinter in the eyes of Quick-Step Alpha Vinyl management, that is not a status carved in stone tablet. It is at best an entry in a cell of a spreadsheet, as erasable as these words here.
And while Cavendish heads to Sicily to continue racing against (and beating) the very best sprinters in the world, on primetime TV, Jakobsen will this week be riding the second-string race that is the Tour de Hongrie, against the likes of Elia Viviani (Ineos Grenadiers) Jon Aberasturi (Trek Segafredo) and Olav Kooij (Jumbo Visma). Dylan Groenewegen (Team BikeExchange-Jayco) too, of course, but the Dutchman has not taken a WorldTour victory in more than two years.
Giro d’Italia
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Lest we imagine otherwise, when it comes to his team selections, as well as the contracts he negotiates with his employees, Patrick Lefevere is not known for being a sentimental. That is the most straightforward explanation for why his teams have always won as much and as consistently as they have.
That, in turn is why he has maintained such a strong grip over the sporting direction of the Belgian outfit.
Cavendish’s success at the Tour last year was astonishing but it was not entirely possible to accurately measure the magnitude of his performances.
‘It’s number 16!’ – Mark Cavendish wins Stage 3 of the Giro
Any rider can only beat those others who show up, but it could be argued that, in no small part due to Caleb Ewan’s stage four crash, as well as a few other lucky breaks, he was not in a position to prove himself against the very best sprinters sprinting at their very best. From what Lefevere has seen of them both, it could be argued that there would be greater risk associated with taking Cavendish to the Tour de France this year, than Jakobsen.
In contrast Jakobsen could destroy the competition at the 2.1 rated Hungarian Tour, taking three or even four stages, and yet still see his star decline, relative to that of Cavendish.
It may not be enough to see him slip from the team’s No. 1 spot, but it could be sufficient to increase the pressure, or even make it a coin-flip between the pair.
‘He’s proven he can go’ – Breakaway team back Cavendish for Tour de France selection
There is, undoubtedly, a heavy dose of Anglo-centric wishful thinking associated with this take. There is even more embedded when Robbie McEwen and Adam Blythe say similar, the latter being a close friend of Cavendish. None of us have anything against Jakobsen, who has a very special story of his own. We simply want to see Cavendish make it 35 Tour wins. We want him to make history. Again.
It is astonishing that it is still possible he could.
– – –
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