Mark Cavendish (Deceuninck-QuickStep) has won his second stage in two days at the Tour of Turkey, just 24 hours after claiming his first victory since 2018.
When Cavendish (35) won stage 2 in Turkey yesterday he took the leader's blue jersey and he has now claimed stage 3 in a big bunch sprint.
The only two Irish riders in the field, Jesse Ewart (Team Sapura Cycling) and Cormac Mcgeough (Wildlife Generation Pro Cycling), finished in the main peloton today on the same time as Cavendish.
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In the final sprint today Cavendish again had to overcome Jasper Philipsen (Alpecin Fenix) and Andre Greipel, whose Israel Start-Up Nation put a lot of resources into leading out the big German.
Philipsen was unlucky in that Greipel's last lead-out man impeded him a little and he then almost tangled with Cavendish and, moments later, with Kristoffer Halvorsen (Uno-X Pro Cycling Team).
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While Philipsen eventually emerged from that congestion, and put in his big final kick to the chequered flag, he finished very fast and gained on the stage winner a little before the line.
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However, Cavendish was once again on point with his speed and timing and his victory at the end of today's 212.6km stage from Beysehir to Alanya confirms he is well and truly back on form for Deceuninck-QuickStep.
Today Philipsen had to be content with 2nd place again, with Polish road race champion Stanisław Aniołkowski (Bingoal Pauwels Sau) in 3rd, Halvorsen 4th and Greipel fading to 5th after a brilliant lead-out.
However, the stage belonged to Cavendish; winning again after such a long barren spell and doing it with confidence and with the race leader's jersey on his shoulders.
More to come.
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