Behind the scenes, Cavendish is working harder than it looks.
With Columbia-HTC’s Mark Cavendish having won four of this year’s nine road stages, it would be easy to assume his sprint victories have come as easily as he makes it appear.
However looks can be deceiving.
On Wednesday the 24-year-old from the Isle of Man equaled his tally of Tour stage wins from last year’s Tour, and in doing so matched the record number of stage wins by a British rider; he also took back the green jersey from Cervélo’s Thor Hushovd.
In fact Cavendish’s ability to continually blast across the finish line ahead of his closest rivals, combined with the selfless work of the best lead-out train in the sport, has every sprinter in the peloton flummoxed.
However in a candid moment after stage 11, Cavendish admitted that he puts an enormous amount of pressure on himself to deliver wins following lead-out efforts by some of the biggest names of the sport, including Kim Kirchen, George Hincapie and Michael Rogers
“I tell you the truth, if I didn’t win after those guys, I wouldn’t sleep tonight,” Cavendish said. “That’s how it is. It’s one thing, I come across as cocky or arrogant when I win, but it’s a massive thing to lose. No one sees the self-loathing when I lose. It’s a hard thing to accept for me. The guys know that I do my best to finish off, and that’s why they work for that.”
Cavendish also said he was a bit anxious during the stage Wednesday when he saw several top sprinters seemingly conspiring on how to beat him.
“I saw all the big sprinters talking and it was worrying me a bit,” he said. “But I said to the guys, all we have to do is to what we do best, and that’s stay together, stay confident and stay focused, and the guys did it.”
The Columbia rider’s morning also started off on the wrong foot with an article published in French sports paper L’Equipe quoting an anonymous French rider who claimed that Cavendish had used derogatory terms towards French riders in the race, and that his arrogance was getting on their nerves.
“Cavendish is racist, he's anti-French,” the anonymous rider reportedly said. “He should be careful. We're not going to put up with his attitude much longer.”
However Cavendish laughed off attempts to discredit him, saying those who couldn’t beat him on the bike might be attempting to defeat him using other methods.
“It was an anonymous French rider and an anonymous author,” Cavendish said. “I just had to laugh at that. I’ve got to take it as a compliment that they keep on criticizing my riding. They are trying to make shit for something else. You know, I have a lot of friends who are French. I made an effort this winter to learn French so I could do interviews. I’m still not confident to speak it, but I can understand it perfectly to answer the questions.
“I just have to laugh about this,” he continued. “I don’t know where it’s come from. I don’t know why it’s come about. What can I do but let people read it how they want to read it? You can’t stop it. I can’t apologize for something I haven’t said. If they want to make shit up, at least have the decency to have the name of the rider who said it, and the author of the article. I just brush it off.”
Cavendish didn’t hesitate to admit that he rubs some riders the wrong way, but said that’s just his personality, and it might be personal, but it’s nothing nationally motivated.
“I get a little hotheaded sometimes, but it's irrelevant the nationality of the rider when you get arsey at someone,” Cavendish said. “When you're a rider with a public profile, you can't be friends with everybody, it's going to be like that. For sure I'm going to get arsey at some lad, because I'm an asshole. But their nationality, and what they look like or where they come from, is irrelevant.”
Another criticism directed at Cavendish was his refusal to do his share of work in the grupetto — the slow bunch of non-climbers that usually works together to get through the difficult mountains stages.
“I'm just content to stay there,” he told French television. “I have to share my energy at certain moments in the race.”
Looking forward, Cavendish will take aim at potential stage wins on both Thursday and Saturday. Asked what advice, if any, he could offer to riders like Tyler Farrar, Thor Hushovd and Tom Boonen, Cavendish was curt: “Cross the line before me.”
Agence France Presse contributed to this report.
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