THERE was no stopping the Manx missile as Mark Cavendish took his second stage win of this year's Tour de France and the 22nd of his career yesterday.
The Team Sky rider held off Matt Goss (Orica-GreenEdge) and Peter Sagan (Liquigas-Cannondale) to claim a commanding victory on the stage 18 sprint finish into Brive-la-Gaillarde.
He now equals Lance Armstrong and Frenchman Andre Darrigade for number of stage wins, joint fourth behind Eddy Merckx on the all-time greats list and his win consolidated what has been a phenomenally successful Tour for Sky. Today Bradley Wiggins stands only hours away from being crowned Britain's first ever winner of the world's most famous race.
It will be Wiggins' 12th day in the maillot jaune; no Tour winner since Bernard Hinault in 1981 has taken the lead so early and managed to hold it. Surely nothing short of catastrophe will stop him climbing atop the podium on the Champs-Elysees in Paris tomorrow.
He retained his lead in the general classification yesterday and starts today's 53.5km time trial from Bonneval to Chartres, 2min 05sec ahead of his team-mate Chris Froome, with Vincenzo Nibali (Liquigas-Cannondale) 2min 41sec behind in third and Jurgen van den Broeck (Lotto-Belisol) fourth at 5min 53sec. Cadel Evans (BMC), the defending champion, is sixth, 9min 57sec down.
Sky could, then, be forgiven for gloating. Lest we forget, this was a team who, when they launched to great fanfare in 2009 with an ambitious mission statement of "creating the first British winner of the Tour de France within five years", were openly laughed at in the world of cycling. They ruffled feathers with their bold entry to the scene. Given previous forays into world-class cycling by British outfits – notably the ill-fated ANC-Halfords in 1987 and now defunct Linda McCartney Racing in 2001 – it is fair to say Sky's potential was underestimated by many.
Team Sky principal Dave Brailsford, who is also British Cycling's performance director, never doubted his vision, though. Nor did loyal wing men, Shane Sutton, Rod Ellingworth and Sean Yates.
As testament to that unwavering faith, Wiggins is now only the fifth British rider in history to wear the yellow jersey, following in the footsteps of Tom Simpson, Chris Boardman, his directeur sportif Yates and David Millar. He seems sure to break his own record, currently shared with the great Robert Millar for the highest British placing on the Tour of fourth spot achieved in 2009 (and by Millar in 1984).
Wiggins will surely be joined in the record books by his team-mate Froome who, barring disaster, will be on the podium in second place.
Cavendish's achievements are no less impressive. The winner of the green jersey points classification last year, he sacrificed his chances of defending that title in order to assist Wiggins' – and Sky's – aspirations of a Tour de France win. His dogged loyalty was rewarded yesterday and he said: "I haven't done anything this Tour, so I saved so much energy. I started to sprint with 500-600m to go and knew I'd get it; I felt really good today. "
He brushed off earlier suggestions that his reported 4kg weight loss ahead of the Tour had diminished his sprint fire power. "I've just not been able to show anything this Tour de France," he said. "We've gone with the yellow jersey; there's been no sprints really. Today we spoke at the start and Sean Yates said it would be an easy day for us. I stuck my hand up and said: 'Please just give me a chance.' Bradley, Chris and Mick [Rogers] committed straight away."
Cavendish added: "I have been waiting to do it for nearly three weeks. Andre Darrigade is the sprinter with the most [Tour] wins: he only won 15 sprints, but he won 22 stages. To match him, I couldn't be happier.
"Physically it has been hard. Mentally it wasn't hard because we had the yellow jersey and second in the general classification. I was full of pride to be part of that. But I'm a sprinter, it's kind of like putting Wayne Rooney in defence. I was part of the winning team but kind of lost in what I was doing. The guys could have cruised into Paris but they commited to my cause. They are a great group of guys."
Wiggins, who helped lead Cavendish out in the final kilometre and could be seen punching the air in delight as his team-mate clinched the win, said: "Mark has been patient and he got his reward today. It's been difficult the last couple of weeks having to put his own goals and aspirations aside. It was nice we were able to do that today and give him another win.
"He has been a true champion and I think today showed that we all wanted to repay him somehow."
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