Mark Cavendish has not been picked by Dimension Data to ride the Tour de France. He has been selected every time since his debut in 2007 and has won 30 stages of the race.
Mark Cavendish has not been picked by his team to ride the Tour de France; the first time in 13 years he has been left out of a Tour team.
Dimension Data has today named its line-up for the race
which gets underway this weekend and the 30-time stage winner is not in the
team.
It is the first time since 2006 that he will not be on
the start line of the race. He was first selected in 2007 and has ridden every
edition since then.
However, crashes and the Epstein Barr virus have conspired
against him in recent years, with his Tour performances well below par. He
hasn’t finished the last three editions.
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He failed to win a stage in his first Tour but then took
four victories in his second edition, in 2008. He won six the following year
then four in 2010 and five in 2011.
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There followed three stage wins in 2012 and two in 2013
before crashing out on stage 1 in 2014. A single victory followed in 2015
before four more in 2016, the last edition he was victorious on.
Now aged 34 years, Cavendish’s career in pro cycling goes
all the way back to 2005 when rode for Team Sparkasse, a Continental team in
Germany.
While Cavendish’s health appeared to be on an upward
trajectory and he has raced regularly this year, he has no results to speak of
and so he has been left off the Tour team.
In the absence of Cavendish Dimension Data has selected
eight riders with five stage wins between them; Edvald Boasson Hagen with three and Steve Cummings with two.
Also in the
line-up are: Reinardt Janse v Rensburg, Michael Valgren, Roman Kreuziger, Giacomo Nizzolo, Ben
King and Lars Bak.
King is the team’s best chance for the general classification. Nizzolo is effectively a sprinter to take Cavendish’s place, though he has no Grand Tour stage victories in his palmares.
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