It's kinda a shame he isn't on a smaller team where he'd be the sprint leader. I'd be interested in seeing if he could challenge for TDF sprints with his current form.
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I doubt he would have been able to turn things around on any other team.
They didn't make him bad so much as they didn't treat him as the only king on their 'hardman' loaded classics team.
Bonimenier
BANNED
No, that was Team Sky all the way to be a better climber, The first go around with Quick Step is they weren't HTC and they tried to be on stages. They couldn't control the stages like HTC could and other teams trains got better. So not only did Quickstep work harder than the other teams, the other teams were better causing Quickstep to get overtaken on stage finishes. Especially Shimano with Kittel.
Mark Cavendish and his 150 wins - Mega Gallery
After taking his 150th win at the Tour of Turkey we look back at the career of the best sprinter of all time
www.cyclingnews.com
Well, not only that but also when Cav was with HTC there was nobody like Kittel in the peloton. Except Greipel. Who was also with HTC. So his potentially biggest competitor was riding the Vuelta and Giro instead.No, that was Team Sky all the way to be a better climber, The first go around with Quick Step is they weren't HTC and they tried to be on stages. They couldn't control the stages like HTC could and other teams trains got better. So not only did Quickstep work harder than the other teams, the other teams were better causing Quickstep to get overtaken on stage finishes. Especially Shimano with Kittel.
Mark Cavendish and his 150 wins - Mega Gallery
After taking his 150th win at the Tour of Turkey we look back at the career of the best sprinter of all time
View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EWjHvcQZpCw&t=13s
Cav was very dominant for very long, so I don't really think the case for weaker competition is that strong. Take Cav out of the equation and suddenly Goss, Farrar and Greipel all look like great sprinters in their day.
Mate, his opposition was *** until Kittel arrived and Greipel got free. Those guys all smashed the likes of Goss and Farrar as well. FFS, The likes of Petacchi, Zabel, McEwen, Feire were all still at the top end of sprinting in their mid to late 30s when Cav took over. Petacchi still managed to beat him a few times ag age 36. Bennati beat Cav a few times at Giro 08, didn't ride the Tour that year, missed a huge chunk of 09 due to injury and was never the same after. Boonen had already transitioned to being a full on Classics rider, whilst Hushovd was a decent sprinter, but not a top one. Half of his 10 Tours win were non bunch finish wins which says it all. Who of Cavs opposition could go out and win 4 stages in a GT like Cipo, McEwen, Petacchi etc could in their pomp. Who else was there?
Compare to Cipo who rode against Van Poppel, Ludwig, Abdu, Nelissen, Zabel, Steels, McEwen, Freire throughout his career, No comparison.
Easy to get big name sprinters when there's 30 GT sprint stages every like 8 dudes are winning 15+ over the course of their careers.
Like, are the sprinting fields better or worse now? Or are there just fewer bunch sprints?
Cav was still beating Greipel in 2011. In 2012 he wasn't the focus and rode the Giro in 12 and 13, to completion. Something the Germans never did. 14 he crashed and that crash affected 15 as he became far more jumpy and sprinting sooner. That crash no doubt cost 3-5 extra stage wins from the 2 tours.
Was the competition that much worse, or was he that much better. Not to mention he was beating Viviani and others performing well now. On Greipel all he ever was better than Cav at was power, worse at everything else.
Are you for real with this nonsense. You think there was more bunch sprints in the 90s than the Cav era. The difference between the early to mid 90s and the Cav era is night and day.
Just as an example, on Cipo's Tour debut in 1992. There was 2...yes 2 full bunch sprints, the first on stage 10, the second in Paris. Yet Cav won six stages in one Tour or how many did Kittel win one Tour, was it 6 as well. Most Tours from the 90s barely had that many bunch finishes.
what's the question again?
Kittel had 5/4/4 stage wins at the Tour
Trentin 4 at the Vuelta
Demare 4 at the Giro
Degenkolb 4 at the Vuelta
Greipel 4 at the Tour
maybe someone else had 4+ stage wins in 1 GT that I don't remember now
Bonimenier
BANNED
Nibali had 4 bunch sprint wins when he won the Tour.
Yeah, but that argument can be flipped as well. If there had been a Klttel level sprinter competing against Cav 08-11 when he was at his most dominant, would he still have won as often? I highly doubt that.
Likewise if Cipo had ridden for an international team like HTC Columbia as opposed to Italian teams, would his focus have been more on the Tour rather than the Giro? As it stands Cipo has more GT wins and more wins period, but apparently Cav is the undisputed greatest sprinter of all-time.
When Cav was on his prime? No. I would take Cav over Kittel anyday. Kittel is a better at positioning Greipel. You bring up Petacchi but he beat Cav 4 times, with 1 from cutting Cav off against the barrier.
Cipo chose to not finish the TdF when he rode it. I doubt that would change riding for another team. He showed that finishing the Giro over the other GTs. With more GT and wins in general from Italian race organizers giving more flat stages for him. Nothing to do with him being on an Italian team.
Bonimenier
BANNED
Freddy Maertens won 20 stages in a year where he rode the Vuelta + 1 week of the Giro. Cavendish is trash!
I am not worried whether you think Cav was better than Kittel or even Greipel, the question is would his dominance have been the same if he had been competing against them in 08-11. I would say absolutely not.
Seriously, of course being an Italian on an Italian team mattered, he focused on the Giro more so of course that had a knock on effect. If he had been an Anglo riding for an international team, I would bet his priority would have been the Tour just like Cavendish. Hard to imagine a time when the Tour was not so all consuming, especially for Italian teams. Del Tongo, his team from 89-91 turned down Tour invites twice(Last team to turn down a Tour invite was???). Cipo beat Abdu 3 times at the Giro in 91, but Adbu was the best sprinter at the Tour in 91 because Cipo wasn't there.
And that's what I'm saying. Cavendish would have still been dominant against Greipel and Kittel if they were on other teams in his dominant era.
Just like his team refused that year, the race organizers started refusing inviting Cipo because of his antics. If you don't make him Italian, suddenly he has far far less Italian wins. You can't have it both ways.
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