Tour of California: Mark Cavendish wins stage 1

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Mark Cavendish (Etixx-QuickStep) claimed the opening stage of the 2015 Tour of California Sunday in Sacramento with a trademark sprint after a perfect leadout from his teammate Mark Renshaw.

The Etixx rider beat all his rivals to the line to take his 10th win of the season ahead of Peter Sagan (Tinkoff-Saxo) and Jempy Drucker (BMC Racing) to pull on the first leader's jersey of the race.

"It was perfect," Cavendish said of his leadout. "Being right behind Mark Renshaw a few places from the front with 300 meters to go is the perfect place to be. I don't have to think. I can save all my energy just for the final sprint. I'm lucky I've got him and the rest of Etixx-QuickStep."

Although Tinkoff-Saxo was there to put Sagan in with a chance, Cavendish said the biggest threat on Sunday was the plethora of experienced US criterium riders he had to contend with on the closing circuits.

"It was a bit nervous because there are a lot of criterium riders here, and it freaked me out in some corners," he said. “They'd dive bomb like Freddie Rodriguez. That kind of makes you want stay near the front a bit more."

Sunday's win marks the third time Cavendish has won in Sacramento. He said the area's terrain makes a sprint finish likely for any stage here, and the wide-open boulevards favour an experienced sprinter and team.

"It's a nice big proper boulevard finish here, big, wide, straight road and it leads to an all-out sprint," he said. "You have to get it tactically and physically right."

In typical form, Cavendish also took an opportunity at the post-race press conference to take another dig at Sagan's team, saying QuickStep and MTN-Qhubeka did most of the work to pull back the breakaway.

"I think one thing I've got is that my team commits," Cavendish said. "We take the race on. We ride. When the TV came on Saxo came to the front, but they hadn't been riding all day. Already the break had come from seven minutes to two minutes, so we had done all the work, along with MTN-Qhubeka.

"For me it definitely helps to have the pressure of my team riding for me and not just doing it to kind of look like they’re doing it."

The day's other big news came when Andrew Talansky (Cannondale-Garmin) was forced to pull out of the race, with his team citing health issues.

Mark Cavendish gets win number ten in 2015. Image: Getty

How it unfolded

Stage 1 started and finished in state capitol Sacramento with 203.1km of racing in between. The pancake flat course lent itself to a sprint finish, with the strong winds outside of town providing the day's biggest obstacle.

After days of interviews, press conferences and appearances, the riders were champing at the bit to get underway, and a breakaway of four riders developed in the early kilometres.

Among the escapees were William Clarke of Drapac Pro Cycling, Steve Fisher of Jelly Belly-Maxxis, Rob Britton of Team SmartStop and his teammate Bobby Sweeting.

"Our strategy worked today," Sweeting said."We wanted to get Rob in the early break to get some time bonuses. The two of us were able to sneak in there. It ended up being a good day in the wind."

The quartet built a gap of nearly seven minutes, but with Etixx-QuickStep taking control behind for Cavendish, the move's chances of success were nil.

The gap started coming down precipitously in the second half of the stage after the leaders turned into a headwind. Britton suffered a mechanical with about 60km remaining and dropped out of the group, leaving Clarke, Fisher and Sweeting to go on without him.

"Once we got out of that exposed section we could let Rob drop back to the field to recover," Sweeting said. "I was just going to try and hang on and make it to the end."

With only three riders in the group, the gap continued to plummet, and the leaders had 2:30 with about 48km to go. MTN-Qhubeka threw several riders into the chase to help QuickStep, and the leaders had just two minutes with 40km to go.

At the final intermediate sprint of the day, just 15.2km from the finish, the leaders' advantage was under a minute, and the bunch sprint looked inevitable.

The escapees entered the circuits with a slight advantage, but they were quickly swallowed up as the peloton raged through town.

Cavendish's lead out man Mark Renshaw led his sprinter into perfect position coming out of the last corner, and Cavendish took over soon after, taking the win by several bike lengths.

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