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Tour de France Tour de France 2021, Stage 13: Nîmes – Carcassonne, 219.9 km

Page 12 - Get up to date with the latest news, scores & standings from the Cycling News Community.
The difference of course is that Cav has 4 wins from 4 sprints. None of the superstars we keep hearing about who would eat him for breakfast ever get more than a 50% hit rate at a grand tour.
Do you really honestly believe that if Ewan was there Cavendish would have 4 from 4. Take Bennett or Ewan out of last year and they would probably have had 4 stages too
 
The difference of course is that Cav has 4 wins from 4 sprints. None of the superstars we keep hearing about who would eat him for breakfast ever get more than a 50% hit rate at a grand tour.
Kittel and Greipel both have 4- and 5-win Tours that Cav started. Ewan and Bennett split 5 of the 6 (maybe 7?) sprint stages between them last year, with VanAert (who has only contested 1 sprint this year) taking the other. And that’s kinda been the point of that side of the argument; on a lot of Cav’s multi-win Tours (like this year) he has been the only top-flight sprinter in the race.
 
He's best every sprinter around though. Until Cav can show he can beat Ewan and Bennett, and even Merlier where Merlier goes for the sprint (Merlier was leadout for Philipsen in the ones he didn't win), can't say he's better than those guys now tbh

He beat Merlier and Ewan in Belgium just before this tour.

Personally I'm not saying he's the best but he has just done something amazing.
 
Kittel and Greipel both have 4- and 5-win Tours that Cav started. Ewan and Bennett split 5 of the 6 (maybe 7?) sprint stages between them last year, with VanAert (who has only contested 1 sprint this year) taking the other. And that’s kinda been the point of that side of the argument; on a lot of Cav’s multi-win Tours (like this year) he has been the only top-flight sprinter in the race.
No doubt he entered the right grand tour but no one could foresee the carnage on some of the early stages for GC and sprinters. But at the moment Matthews is not even getting close.
 
Cipollini finished Tour and Vuelta exactly 0 times, and Giro sprinting field in his era was not the best either.

Ya, I won't deny his attitude in regards finishing GTs was crap, but his record in sprints is still ridiculous. Between 1989 and 2003, he failed to win a GT stage only once in 94 and that's cos he had a big crash and only did like 3 GT stages that year (missed the Giro and Tour). He has the most sprint stage wins ever, 2nd most GT stage wins overall behind Merckx and regularly best everyone around in sprints he entered. Considering he barely ever finished a GT, his win rate from stages entered to win is ridiculous.
 
You can say chapeau to Cavendish for beating who is here and also say these sprints would be more interesting with a few of Ewan, Ackermann, Démare/Ackermann not in *** form, Bennett on another team, Merlier here.

I'm not saying Cavendish would be losing every stage to all of them but they would be better competition than second-tier guys like Philipsen, Bouhanni, Greipel, Van Poppel.

I thought Matthews and espcially Colbrelli would be more of a factor but eh.
 
No doubt he entered the right grand tour but no one could foresee the carnage on some of the early stages for GC and sprinters. But at the moment Matthews is not even getting close.
Matthews never gets close. The year he won green, he was winning stages on top of hills in Mende, and finishing 7th in flat stages, and all the other sprinters crashed out or DNF. The year after, Sunweb had him leading out for Bol.

There’s always an element of right-place-right-time in sprinting, Cav has proven to be the best at that for many years, in more ways than one.
 
Matthews never gets close. The year he won green, he was winning stages on top of hills in Mende, and finishing 7th in flat stages, and all the other sprinters crashed out or DNF. The year after, Sunweb had him leading out for Bol.

There’s always an element of right-place-right-time in sprinting, Cav has proven to be the best at that for many years, in more ways than one.
Yes these days Matthews is the master at bunch sprints for fourth place. Like Sagan he's missing some of the top end speed he used to have but he was never a flat sprint specialist but on his day like Gerrans he could do enough to win a flat sprint sometimes.
 
First thing he did was park his bike, get off, and figuratively die on the ground. That was a right mess with then being swapped and I think Quickstep did panic a little when they got swapped and separated with I believe Ballerini going for it and Morkov looked like he was actually sprinting for it until he realized Cav was alongside him.

Imagine Morkov accidentally (or "accidentally") taking that win. ;):D
 

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