While the world of cycling raged and ranted over Tour de France doping scandals – plus ca change, as the French might say – Mark Cavendish, world road race champion and BBC sports personality of the year, was getting on with his job.
As the fog lifted on the long-winded investigations into Lance Armstrong and Alberto Contador, Cavendish was racking up his first win of the 2012 season, racing at the Tour of Qatar, with new sponsor Team Sky. The world cycling champion may have fallen ill, just hours before the race, but typically he was back to his best almost immediately, winning stage three, in a desert far from his adopted home in rural Essex.
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