Mark Cavendish's new book about his return to form last season and his four Tour de France stage wins reveals Deceuninck-QuickStep team boss Patrick Lefevere offered him a place on his team but no money, which the rider accepted.
While it was known before now that Cavendish secured a sponsor to pay him a salary last year, it was assumed that money supplemented a basic salary from the team.
However, the Manx rider's new book reveals Lefevere told him he had no money at all to pay him, not even minimum wage, and so Cavendish signed for free, but with a salary from a sponsor.
“Look, I would have stopped two years ago if I didn’t think I was good enough to win,” Cavendish told Lefevere when they met just over 12 months ago when Cavendish had no contract for 2021 and had been interviewed crying at Gent-Wevelgem.
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“Every year that I ride without winning it damages my legacy. It’s not about the money now. I just have to prove that it’s not my problem. Or that what’s happened in the last year has been my problem but not my fault. I can’t talk about what’s set me back publicly — at least not yet — but put me in an environment where I have no excuses, I promise that I’ll win.”
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He added when he had said his piece "I’d noticed his posture shifting. From friendliness, it had moved first to sympathy, then curiosity and finally a sort of tentative engagement".
But then Lefevere leaned forward and said: “The problem is, Mark, that I’m at the limit with my budget. I can’t . . .”
Cavendish's book adds: “Pay me minimum wage,” I blurted, without letting him finish. “It’s not about the money, because that’ll come when I win for you." Patrick smiled apologetically. “Mark, I have one spot in the team . . . but no money. Not even to pay the minimum wage.”
Cavendish also explains in the book that when his friend and mentor - and former Team GB and Bahrain Victorious manager - Rod Ellingworth told him last year the team had no place for him his year, he was stunned.
"The idea that Rod had now defected to the camp of the disbelievers cut deep," he writes of being told by Ellingworth Bahrain Victorious was not offering him a contract for 2021. "After years of setbacks that, one by one, had chipped away at my spirit and legacy, this felt like death by the thousandth cut.
"I was crestfallen, dumbfounded, incandescent. And, above all, totally in limbo, contemplating a retirement I didn’t want, hadn’t prepared for. Mid-October was late, simply too late to begin the process of sounding out other teams, aligning demands and expectations..."
