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Teams & Riders Mark Cavendish Discussion Thread

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TechnicalDescent said:
He is clearly the main man for Sky this tour. He is holding the points jersey. He is also the world champion. He has an important sprint the next day. I think it was unusual. He has done this on many occasions during the tour and is great to see. It shows you that he's not the arrogant selfish guy some make him out to be.

It shows that he's not always the arrogant selfish guy that he often presents himself to be.
 
TechnicalDescent said:
I disagree. It's unusual to see the most protected rider of the team, who holds a jersey and has a big stage the next day, doing water carrying duties at the end of the Giro. Kelly remains correct. We should praise Cav for this.

Or question his common sense in exerting energy needlessly when there are other riders appointed to the team just for that purpose. Looks more like a pr stunt than a sincere effort to contribute to team's cause. The results of that big stage that followed would indicate that maybe he should have been resting instead of fetching bottles. The grand tours are a marathon and not a sprint and savings one's energy's for the points that it's needed most is one of the cardinal rules especially for those riders that are the most important to that particular team's success. I'll grant that it was likely a sincere effort to contribute to Uran's and Sky's gc ambitions but was it necessary or smart considering?
 
Since when did carrying bottles become "work"? Bottle carrying duties occur when the pace slackerens and riders go back to the cars to stock up. There's good reason why Cav went back. He can hang on for 3-4 Kim's, get the bottles and return to the peloton. Does anyone realize that there's no actual racing during this time? It's a cycling timeout......
 
Mar 17, 2009
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Libertine Seguros said:
To which the answer is, I'm not sure, but I think it is.

No, it is not Lombardia, it's the Giro.

This is Lombardia
lomb_4508.jpg

Gold bike, not white.
 
Aug 12, 2011
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thehog said:
And Twitter is not a way to communicate to human beings.

+1 Couldn't agree more. Never has something been more aptly named than "Twitter".

Caruut said:
He is, really, just a great sprinter, and that's more or less it.

+1 Good summary. He is a fantastic bike rider over about 200m and good luck to him for making the most of a very narrow skill set.

But there is not a lot else going on there really. As even his fans says say "what you see is what you get" and I doubt that's going to change anytime soon.
 
TechnicalDescent said:
Where did he state this? He specifically said he was not angry with him.

If you look up thread I have already related what Alessandra de Stefano asked, Mark, point blank, indeed it was the first thing she asked him, on Il processo della tappa immediately following the stage. First in English (since he still doesn't understande Italian well) and then in Italian: "Why, Mark, were you angry with Guardini?" "Perchè eri arrabbiata con Guardini Mark?"

Cavendish: "Because I hate to lose."

End of story.
 
Aug 16, 2011
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May 20, 2010
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Yes it has been discussed. Riders cannot control the tifosi. If they start to push a rider they can hardly stop and get into a fight with them.

Also Cav was not the only rider to receive such a massive push on that stage. Phinney got one as well.
 
MrRoboto said:
And there you can see how close they are watching Cav --->

A second video was posted, however, which showed that that guy was just a member of the tifosi, and what looked like Giro accreditation was probably a freebie from the race caravan. As has been mentioned, the commissaires and riders can't control the fans. When I was on the Urkiola last year there was one fan near us who would sprint as far as he could up the hill pushing stragglers, then run back down to his position and wait for the next lone straggler (he only did it for guys who were on their own) and do it all again. The commissaires let it go. He's not doing anybody any harm. If he was prejudicing the results by doing it to that extent for front runners, they might have done something, but ultimately giving a few lone stragglers a push has little effect.

You could argue that keeping Cavendish in the time limit does prejudice the results, which would be a fair point, but at the same time, Cavendish hasn't been expelled from the race for it, and it isn't something that Sky or Cavendish can be blamed for (not like it was holding cars etc). Not unless Team Sky have a bunch of guys that they plant among the tifosi on every climb to push Cavendish along, which sounds pretty far-fetched.
 
May 13, 2012
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I hate to say I told you so, but it looks like Cav had good reason to be angry at the situation when he lost. He could have won the points jersey if Guardini hadn't been breaking the rules to get through the giro.
 
TechnicalDescent said:
I hate to say I told you so, but it looks like Cav had good reason to be angry at the situation when he lost. He could have won the points jersey if Guardini hadn't been breaking the rules to get through the giro.

Yeah, going by the logic of the Cav haters here, he was clearly cheated out of the points jersey by Guardini, who had more energy in the final week by breaking the rules.

I wouldn't go as far to agree with this, but the parallels are very obvious, and if I had more faith in humanity, I would hope this ends all the blathering about Cav on the Etna last year.

It's certainly something I'm going to point out every time now when someone accuses Cavendish of cheating his way to sprint wins.
 
Jul 16, 2010
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spalco said:
Yeah, going by the logic of the Cav haters here, he was clearly cheated out of the points jersey by Guardini, who had more energy in the final week by breaking the rules.

I wouldn't go as far to agree with this, but the parallels are very obvious, and if I had more faith in humanity, I would hope this ends all the blathering about Cav on the Etna last year.

It's certainly something I'm going to point out every time now when someone accuses Cavendish of cheating his way to sprint wins.

Just because someone else "cheats"(read the whole story about why they were taken out of the race by the way.) doesn't make it ok for Cavendish to cheat. He should've missed the time cut already at stage 6.

In the Tour of Belgium Marcel Sieberg blatantly cheated during a stage to get back and he didn't get punished because he's Greipel's main helper. It's not because you're not getting caught/punished that you're innocent. ;)
 
Nonsense. He was pushed by some random guy on the road. Not his fault and not cheating.

On the other hand Cavendish did lose the points jersey because of a confirmed and "convicted" cheater, that's a fact. You are just speculating.

The jersey did find a worthy winner, so I'm not mad about it, but that fact remains.
 
Jul 16, 2010
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It's cheating because it's a direct violation of the rules. YOU don't decide what's against the rules or not. And you still didn't read WHY Guardini and co got removed from the Giro, did you?
 
El Pistolero said:
It's cheating because it's a direct violation of the rules. YOU don't decide what's against the rules or not. And you still didn't read WHY Guardini and co got removed from the Giro, did you?

This is a genuine question, and not trolling - I didn't know Guardini got removed from the Giro until I just read this thread, and I haven't the time now to go googling.

Why did Guardini and co get removed from the Giro?
 

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