Manxman wins opening Tour de France stage and the first maillot jaune of his career
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Cyclingnews Rider of the Day(Image credit: Immediate Media)
Mark Cavendish (Dimension Data) wins stage 1 and earns his first ever yellow jersey(Image credit: Tim de Waele/TDWSport.com)
Mark Cavendish savours his first maillot jaune(Image credit: Tim de Waele/TDWSport.com)
Mark Cavendish got a front seat as Dimension Data get a ride to the team presentation
Mark Cavendish at the pre-Tour press conference.(Image credit: Tim de Waele/TDWSport.com)
Despite a glittering career that now includes 27 stage wins in the Tour de France, the one missing garment in Mark Cavendish's wardrobe was a maillot jaune. Now, after a Tour career stretching back almost a decade, the British sprinter finally has the most prized jersey in all of cycling.
After misses in Corsica and Yorkshire through previous years, this win at Utah Beach will feel all the sweeter, especially for a rider many had written off.
Heading into the first stage of this year's Tour most pundits and commentators would have put their money on either Andre Greipel or Marcel Kittel – the two sprinters who have dominated the Tour in the last few years. Their form, their immensely powerful leadouts, and Cavendish's route to the Tour via a mix of road and track, combined to suggest that the German pair were the favourites.
But Cavendish (Dimension Data) is a rider who can never be counted out. His leadout lacked numbers in the final kilometre on stage 1 but it was the smartest and coolest, letting the Katusha and Lotto trains duke it out before Cavendish – well positioned by a string of Dimension Data riders – took over.
His guile and speed of thought have always been underrated and overshadowed in the past by his pure speed, but all of those qualities were demonstrated on stage 1. He snuck onto the back of Griepel's leadout man and then he anticipated an early move from Peter Sagan, allowing the world Champion to virtually lead him to the line. Even with Marcel Kittel bearing down on, he had enough in reserve the hold the opposition at bay.
A stage, a green jersey, finally beating Marcel Kittel and most importantly of all, finally wearing the yellow jersey, Mark Cavendish proved that he is far from a spent force.
Daniel Benson: On the eve of the Tour many felt that Cavendish was a spent force. He had won 'just' a single stage last year – and his combination of track and road this season had led to understandable questions over his form. Winning in California answered the critics to some degree but the Tour is a different beast entirely. This wasn't his best sprint win at the Tour but it was certainly one of the most important – for his Tour, for his team, for his summer, and his career.
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Daniel Benson was the Editor in Chief at Cyclingnews.com between 2008 and 2022. Based in the UK, he joined the Cyclingnews team in 2008 as the site's first UK-based Managing Editor. In that time, he reported on over a dozen editions of the Tour de France, several World Championships, the Tour Down Under, Spring Classics, and the London 2012 Olympic Games. With the help of the excellent editorial team, he ran the coverage on Cyclingnews and has interviewed leading figures in the sport including UCI Presidents and Tour de France winners.
