050 051 INTERVIEW Muzzled Mark Cavendish’s tenure as Sky’s sprinting star has been a mix of highs and lows as the Manxman played second fiddle to the aspirations of a team hell bent on the GC. So what now for the single-minded 27 year old? Words Sophie Smith Photos Richard Baybutt, Graham Watson, Yuzuru Sunada, Doug Pensinger/Bryn Lennon/Getty Images av is James Bond, In 2012 Mark Cavendish was a — three apiece at the Giro d’Italia and Liam Gallagher, champion by title as well as nature. Tour de France — and 15 races in total. Benny Hill and Holm was in the Great Britain team That’s three more wins than he achieved “C Eddy Merckx in the car with coach Rod Ellingworth when last year, although in 2011 he realised same person,” says his friend and former the sprinter won gold at the World Road two career goals, winning both the team manager Brian Holm. Race Championships in Denmark last green jersey at the Tour and the rainbow “Last week he said: ‘Listen Brian, half year. But he and Cavendish have had jersey. In terms of race victories his 15 of the bunch hate me.’ I had to correct little professional contact this season wins made him the most successful him and say: ‘Listen Cav, 90 per cent of having joined different outfits following world champion since Tom Boonen in the bunch f***ing hate you.’ the demise of HTC-Highroad. Holm 2006 with the same number. “It’s because he’s so loud, using his went to Omega Pharma-Quick Step and “Every time I pulled on the rainbow elbows, fighting like a mad dog, yelling Cavendish, the first British world jersey it really did mean something to at people. You have to know him. champion since Tom Simpson in 1965, me,” Cavendish tells Cycle Sport. Team-mates, people around him always moved to his ‘home’ team Sky in a “In times of being quite depressed, love him but he’s always got the feelings three-year deal, which, at the time of demoralised, you can think: ‘I don’t on the outside. print, looked to be coming to a know if I’m going to get through this “He puts a lot of pressure on himself premature end. Omega had expressed race today’. And then you pull the jersey in the races. When he has to win he gets the most interest in the Manxman amid on and you’re like, ‘I’ve got to do this nervous, he’s verbal, you can’t boss him transfer speculation. proud. It’s been an honour to wear it.’” around in the bunch. But despite personal success along “Erik Zabel was exactly the same. Champion year with the team performance of the year When he quit, Zabel said to me: ‘I didn’t In his reign as world champion at the Tour, which his team-mate make too many friends when I was riding.’” Cavendish won six Grand Tour stages Bradley Wiggins famously won, 052 INTERVIEW Mark Cavendish 053 Cavendish had a trying season. He was we had to stop riding. I’ve had a Clockwise from top: negotiating a contract extension with a bonus rider as opposed to an outright successful year but achieved nowhere Cavendish was below Team Sky, followed Cavendish to the leader at the Tour and for the first time near what I could have so naturally par at Milan-San Remo; British team but the latter lost his chief operated with restrictions on what he I’m frustrated.” Ghent-Wevelgem is lead-out man in Mark Renshaw, who does best — winning stages. Cavendish was well known before he still an objective; the went to Rabobank. “Three stage wins is good for a team won the World Championships in Giro saw Cavendish “I joined Sky — for me it was the let alone an individual rider, but it’s my Copenhagen, but that win made him a back to his best best team in the world, it had the best lowest count at the Tour, where I was in star. Signing with the Wasserman Media management, the best riders, the best the best form of my life,” Cavendish says. Group provided structure as did the structure to get the most out of yourself. “I’d done the best preparation up to recruitment of former national I was able to get the most out of myself it, I was with a strong team and I was team-mate and friend Rob Hayles, who up until I raced,” Cavendish says. wearing the rainbow jersey yet I got my effectively became a personal assistant. The 27 year old is familiar with many lowest total. “He was flat-out busy starting back of the riders and staff at Sky, having “We won the yellow jersey and it was training and also getting ready for the come through the British Cycling a big thing. It can easily be something Academy with many of his team-mates. you can sit there and go professionally, “Three stage wins is good for a team One of them, Geraint Thomas, was an ‘Oh, it’s good to win’. But really, as a able pilot in Copenhagen but had a British rider in a British team and all let alone an individual, but it’s my limited road programme this season — that, plus Brad is like my big brother; lowest count at the T he notably skipped the Tour — due to to go and help him win yellow, after our. I’d done the his track commitments at the Olympics. everything we’ve been through with best preparation, I was with the best “Geraint was preparing for the track the Worlds is a big thing in my career. so I didn’t race with him and then I “We won six stages and the yellow team and I was in the rainbow jersey” didn’t really gel with the others. Not jersey and second [in Chris Froome], but personally, we all really got on, but on I think easily, without detriment to the BBC Sports Personality of the Year the bike, we kind of didn’t. I was always yellow jersey, we could have won 10 [which he won]. There was an awful lot in a more vulnerable position. Whereas stages and the yellow jersey. So with my of publicity for that. He was doing a lot Brad went to every race with the same mentality, I’m like, ‘how can we be of photoshoots with Head & Shoulders, team I went with a different team to happy with six if we could have quite Nike, Oakley and then all the Sky stuff,” every race,” Cavendish says. easily won 10?’” Hayles says. Cavendish believes that contributed As illustrations Cavendish offers “I was actually quite surprised how to the number of crashes he had this stage 13 to Cap d’Agde that featured the busy he was away from the bike. A lot of year from his first race of the season, the category-three Mont Saint Clair some the time he didn’t know what the Tour of Qatar in February, onwards. 23 kilometres from the flat finish, as well photoshoot was for, he was that busy.” “When I was at HTC we were as the rolling 15th stage to Pau, where Cavendish was named as the 22nd always leading it out so everyone was Sky decided not to bring back the break most marketable athlete in the 2012 on my wheel. Here I was always fighting after a manic start. Sportspro 50 list. and hit the deck first in Qatar and I’ve The sprinter’s year as world crashed more times since then,” he says. Losing to win champion, with a new team, coincided “Every crash I’ve had this year has been “I think I could have won two more and with the birth of his first child as well as in a sprint because I’ve been in a more Froomey could have won two more,” the London Olympic Games road race vulnerable situation.” he continues. which, along with Milan-San Remo and Brian Holm adds that fearlessness “To Cap d’Agde, where [André] Tour de France success, was a major also plays a part. “It’s because he wants Greipel won, with HTC I would’ve got season objective. to win and he does move,” says the over that climb because the team would “This year was always going to be Dane. “Whether riders admit this to have been around me. If we had got the hardest for him with the change of themselves or not is hard to tell but in back on I would have won that. But that team, the Olympics so close to the Tour each bunch sprint they’re basically was a stage where doing that would be and the pressure that was there, but also risking their life. For someone like Mark, detrimental to the yellow jersey so it’s becoming a father,” Hayles says. he’s got enormous pressure on him, like worth losing that stage to win the yellow Zabel did in the past. jersey. I didn’t even say I want to go for it New train “They’re very intense, good sprinters, because I would have needed a whole Part of the challenge was learning to because it’s like boxers getting into the team. But then the likes of Pau, that’s no work with a new lead-out train. His ring. There’s a lot of adrenaline going detriment to the yellow jersey and yet confidant, Bernhard Eisel, who is around in the body even after the 054 INTERVIEW Mark Cavendish 055 “Geraint was preparing for the track so I didn’t race with him and then I didn’t really gel with the others.