Manx sprinter decides against tough Alpine stage with after effects of Tuesday's pile up
HTC-Columbia sprinter Mark Cavendish did not take the start of today’s tough sixth stage of the Tour de Suisse. The 25-year-old Manx Express is suffering from the after effects of the stage 4 finish line crash, which also ended the races of Heinrich Haussler (cervelo TestTeam), Arnaud Coyot (Caisse d’Epargne), Lloyd Mondory and Sébastien Hinault (both AG2R-La Mondiale).
“The stage looks tough,” an HTC-Columbia team spokesman told Belga, “it’s better that he does not take the start.”
The crash, for which Cavendish was blamed, saw the Manxman hit the tarmac with his right side causing him multiple abrasions to his back, shoulder and elbow. Teammate and lead out man Mark Renshaw posted a picture of Cavendish on Twitter yesterday showing his extensive wound dressings. He started yesterday’s stage, which was suited to the sprinters on paper, but he finished in a small group 11’07” behind stage winner Marcus Burghardt (BMC Racing); more than 10 minutes behind the peloton.
It has not been a good first half of the season for Cavendish. He was the outstanding sprinter of 2009, whose wins included Milano-Sanremo and an incredible six stages of the Tour de France, but so far has been unable to match that dominance.
Dental problems disrupted his early season preparation and he often found himself outsprinted by riders that he would have routinely beaten last year. He seemed to have returned to form in April’s Tour de Romandie, but a defiant two-fingered gesture as he crossed the line to win stage 2 in Fribourg saw him removed from the race by his team. He returned to win the first stage of the Tour of California last month, but failed to dominate and finished outside the time limit on the tough sixth stage to Big Bear Lake.
Tuesday’s incident was not the first spectacular crash involving Cavendish this season either. In the closing kilometres of the final stage of Tirreno-Adriatico he came down hard as the peloton took a wide sweeping bend; however, on that occasion it appeared to be a technical issue that caused the crash.