Mark Cavendish: Cycling’s World Sprint Star
Story posted August 8
By Larry Hickmott (larryhickmott@britishcycling.org.uk)
You only need to see the public adoration Mark Cavendish has in places like Belgium to see just how much of a superstar this young man has become. His stage victories in the Tour of Italy and the Tour de France have made him one of, if not the hottest property in cycling.
He is quite simply a sprint legend in the making. Four stage wins in the Tour de France, a first for a British rider, makes him one of the sprint greats and his 11 victories this year is proof, if needed, that he really is the main man when it comes to road sprinting in 2008. Mark though is a cyclist from Britain and as such he doesn’t really get the credit his talent deserves here in Britain in the same way it does in countries where cycling is a major sport. The same could be said for all our sporting hero’s in cycling from Team GB.
It is such a shame for the sport here that some one like Mark,and the others, are not given the same respect as people from other sports who have not achieved in the same way they have on the World stage. The profile of cycling may be getting better in the media and therefore in the eyes of the public but there is still a way to go if some of the tales Mark was telling me are anything to go by.
Thursday, August 7 and far from the glamour and atmosphere of the Tour de France, Great Britain's Mark Cavendish is lap by lap putting himself into a box during a gut wrenching session at the Manchester Velodrome. It is the side of Mark that few see, the one where the hard work is done so he can go into a race well prepared and ready to taste another victory.
The Isle of Man rider though does have his fans here in Britain! On Monday, Mark arrived at the velodrome at Manchester at the end of a children’s session on the track. Far from the kit he was pictured in at the Tour de France winning stages, Mark arrived dressed in a Nike t-shirt, Hincapie jeans, and a chunky Nike watch and you sensed the change of atmosphere as he walked in and was recognised by the future stars.
Heads turned, cameras were fetched from bags, and mothers and children started to head for Mark as he sat down with the other Great Britain riders getting ready for a training session on the boards. Like other GB stars who I have seen get swamped for autographs, Mark was only too pleased to stand and be photographed or sign autographs for riders who may well become stars like him in the future.
Mark is a much more confident rider than he was way back in 2005 when I got to know him at the Track Worlds. And he is also a rider who not only loves his sport, but is very respectful of it and watch out if ever he was asked to go on Sporting Mastermind because I am sure he would surprise a few people with his knowledge and insightful view of the sport that has brought him stardom.
The Olympics Beckons
Mark is in Manchester to prepare for the Olympic Games. His season this year has been one hell of a long roller coaster and the Olympics in Beijing are the latest in that long ride he is on. The ‘year’ began with World Track Cups in Australia and China a month or so after the end of last years road season and he then progressed to the road and the Tour of California where he had his first ‘victory’. A major goal was the World Track Championships and he won there before heading back to the road and more big races like Romandy and the Giro to name just two of many.
Then came the Tour de France and now the Olympics. It is non stop for the Columbia and Great Britain rider but still he’s ready for the challenge. “I am buzzing for it” he said first when asked how he felt about being in the GB Olympic team.
“We have a really great team which will go there and be successful and that is what I want to be part of. Sure, I have been on a high these last few months which means the Olympics has not been my sole goal for the season. If it had been, I am sure the Olympics would feel a lot lot bigger for me. It is though just another bike race but a big bike race nonetheless.”
“Because it’s not the only race I’m doing this year, that takes the edge off it but I am still going out there to give it everything I have — it doesn’t change the ambition I have to go and win because every bike race is important.”
Mark is very mindful of that he started out with an Under 23 Academy that was created to produce riders to go to the Olympics for Great Britain and win medals. That initiative has certainly worked well for the team with seven Academy riders in the GB Olympic team.
After two weeks of racing in the Tour de France, and four victories, Mark has been busy since resting and honouring post Tour circuit races in Europe. Now, for this next week he is Manchester to sharpen up on the track for five days. His taper he says is still a week away and for now, the hard work continues as he looks at converting the great form he has on the road to great form on the track.
2005, Los Angeles and the first of his two titles in the Madison event. This one with Rob Hayles while the one in 2008 was with Bradley Wiggins.
His coach at Manchester is Rod Ellingworth, the person responsible for creating and running the Olympic Academy which has produced so many great bike riders in just a few short years. “As soon as I knew there was a possibility of going to the Olympics” Mark explains “I said to Shane (Sutton) last year I want Rod with me. I don’t care if its Newport or Manchester or Beijing even, I wanted Rod there to help me.”
“He knows how I work physically and mentally and its massive to have him here with me. Being a road pro, I’m a little bit out of the system here and although its good to be with the guys, I can feel it some times so it is good to have Rod here as I am constantly in touch with him even when I’m racing in the Tour and so on.”
The bond between coach and rider is easy to see. Through out the first training session on the track, Mark was being paced by Rod and there was a constant chatter between the two. So much so the other GB riders were hoping to see Rod up the pace to see at what point Mark went quiet!
Mark also came to Manchester to do doing a trial for the Individual Pursuit. Great Britain can have two riders in the event and when Geraint Thomas did a 4.17 in training, there has been talk of him perhaps having a go at that event. That though may impact on the Team Pursuit, the big focus for the team, and so whether he rides will depend on many factors.
Which may leave a spot in the Individual Pursuit open for an endurance rider and Mark is willing to give it a go even though the event itself does not hold any special fascination for him. “If it wasn’t the Olympics, it would be a good event to do for a work out for the Madison but it is the Olympics and so I can’t go in with the name I now have and do a crap ride. You can’t do that at the Olympics.”
Hence the trial at Manchester just to see how he does at the event and then Mark and the team will make a call on whether anybody fills that second Pursuit spot. At the time of writing, Mark had been on the track for the trial, recorded a time much faster than he has ever done before and went away to decide whether he would do another before making a decision on whether he throws his hat into the ring for the Individual Pursuit.
His goal event is the Madison. In the last two Olympics, his partner Bradley Wiggins has won a Bronze (Athens) and went close in Sydney and only a crash prevented him and his then partner Rob Hayles from another medal in this difficult but exciting event.
Mark acknowledged that because of all the work he did last winter with Brad at two World Track Cups and the Gent Six, that technically he doesn’t need to be working on anything for the Madison other than finding his track legs.
“When I won the Worlds with Rob (2005), we hadn’t done any work before it. I think once you’re established in this event you can go out there with anybody with little technical preparation”.
Established he certainly is with two World titles to his name in the Madison and being such a winner, he explained that he’ll be really disappointed if he and Bradley don’t win in Beijing. “We will have failed miserably” he says. Given he has won so much on the road as well as the track, and should the Beijing RR have been on a flat sprinters course, what would his preferred event be? “Maybe I would try both” he replied. “I think that is what I’ll plan for 2012. The road though is where my heart is and while I was growing up I watched the Classics, the Tours and so on and so that is what I have wanted to do.”
Asked if he feels nervous about the Olympics ahead, Mark replies “Not at the moment. I won’t deny though that once I get there I will be but at the moment, no. There is no point being nervous now as it’s wasted energy. I’ll do what I have to do here and then I’ll get nervous.”
Mark pictured not that long ago in North Yorkshire for the British Championships.
Post Tour wind down
Since the Tour de France, Mark returned to his new home on the Isle of Man and spent a week riding easily before departing for the post Tour circuit races in Europe. For five nights in a row, 100 kilometres in each event, Mark raced in front of big crowds and dispelled any notion that these races may be easy in any shape or form.
“They are hard and fast” he emphasized. “Okay, they are not hard like a one day classic but they are hard as you have to keep the speed up the whole way. You have to show you are pro bike rider because the crowd doesn’t want to see a load of guys riding around talking so you have to race.”
And race he did, winning a few of them and saying that “in my generation, I am now among the big hitters. This is what I do and so I don’t go out there to beat specific people like Boonen, I do it to beat everyone. I’d do the same if they were fourth cats”.
A Tour Great
When I had spoken to Mark before the Tour de France, he mentioned that he had to win a stage to be one of the great sprinters of his generation. After the Tour, he is without a doubt the best sprinter in the world right now. It took me back to my days as a young rider when a certain Freddy Maertens was twice a world road cycling champion and would regularly win stages in the Tour, eight in one memorable Tour.
I mentioned this to Mark and he smiled and said, “let me tell you a story!”
“I was at a crit last Monday at Aalst and an old guy comes up to me with a Columbia jersey. He wanted me to sign it and I looked at him and knew I had met him before but couldn’t remember his name. A journalist said to me at the time, ‘do you know who this is -- this is Freddy Maertens.’”
“I smiled and I said to Freddy, you really want ME to sign the jersey? He said yes, so I signed it ‘To Freddy, best wishes Mark Cavendish, Tour 2008’. Then, I got him to sign my jersey and I rode it in the Aalst Criterium! That is pretty special when some one like that comes up and wants you to sign a jersey for them. It hits home what I have achieved already.”
Mark then discussed his Tour de France saying that because of his wins the last two years, he does get more room in the race as more riders look to fight over his wheel instead of him having to fight over some one else’s. We then chatted about his wins and for me, the real special victory, the one I felt took the most skill and bottle and speed was the one in the rain.
Mark though had a different stage to pick out. “Maybe my last win because I was so dead then. I knew I had to give it everything and it was the margin I won by. It sounds arrogant and unfair to the others but in the other sprints I didn’t go full gas but on the last stage I won, I went full out and you could see how far I ahead I was. Dropping Robbie off my wheel, I showed how fast I am even when I am tired.”
“I think after my third win, I had a psychological advantage over the others. If you win one, okay every sprinter wins one, then if you win two, you’re good but if you win three, then its like there is no beating this guy. And they said that it to me.”
What I loved about watching Mark sprint in the Tour de France was his bottle to bounce off other riders, keep position and then out jump everyone else. I asked is being a successful sprinter as much about bottle as it is speed?
“Absolutely. Bunch sprinting when you have everyone, not just the guys going for the win but their teammates around you, for sure you have to have bottle but you don’t need as much when you have a great team around you. I didn’t have to take so many risks because I had such a great team. I didn’t have to duck and dive. I had guys to bring me to the front and keep me there and that made it a hell of a lot easier. When that happens you can win by a bigger margin and that was what was happening because I had the best team to set me up.”
He then gave me an insight into how he, a sprinter, differs to the likes of Eric Zabel.
“I do have better jump than those guys as does Robbie. They may ride a 54 whereas I’ll ride a 53 but we all use the 11 in the sprint. There are a lot of strong sprinters, like Boonen, Steegmans, and Zabel and they are all mashing the big gears to the end. Me and Robbie though will spin a gear until the last minute and then we knock it down to the 11 for the sprint. Bombing around on the little gears enables you to move around the bunch a lot easier with a lot less effort.”
Sprinters life far from easy in the Tour
Anyone who has done a stage race will know of how the fatigue of racing day after day can start to get to you but for the Tour riders, with big mountains and being lined out kilometre after kilometre, fatigue can reach a whole new level.
“When you get on your bike to ride to the signing on, the legs hurt. They always hurt. It was the heat more than anything. You can drink so much and still feel dehydrated and in reality you can’t drink enough on those hot days that take so much out of you. And it’s the same for everybody.”
Mark then dispels the thought that sprinters have an easy time in the Tour. “What angers me is that people think a sprinter has an easy job - sit in and sprint. A sprinter has a harder job than a GC rider really. A GC rider is supported and sheltered by his team, and they don’t have to do anything on a flat day.”
“Okay, in the mountains they have to but physically they are capable of doing that. A sprinter though has to go full gas in the prologue and limit their losses in case they win the next stage and get the Yellow jersey. Then, on the sprint days we have to concentrate all day to be our very best in the final for the sprint. Then, if the day is rolling and it could be a bunch sprint, we have to give it full gas over every little climb in case it is a bunch sprint and then if so, we have to be there in the sprint.”
“In the mountains, we are so crap on the climbs that although we may be going slower, we have to still put in the same effort as the GC riders just to survive. Every day is full gas and there are people who don’t appreciate that. It is something that is mentally tiring as well physically.”
“I’m lucky though I have a good group of guys around me. It’s a massive key to the success of our team. We have such a laugh off the bike, its such a fun team that it makes it worthwhile being away from home. If you have a bad day, we look forward and that is the key to our team and my success, that I have these super guys with me.”
Mark Cavendish -- Passionate about cycling
Prior to the interview on Monday at the Velodrome, we had a little discussion about the future of certain track events and what sort of riders will be riding them at the next Olympics. There was also a little pre-Olympic quiz too and through out it all, Mark showed he is as much a mastermind for cycling as he is masterful in a sprint.
“Yeah, I just love it. I have been riding my bike since I was a kid, even before I was racing. Before I was cycling proper, I can remember Chris Boardman had just won the Olympic Pursuit when I was about 7 or 8 and I was in a park and I said to my mate, ‘we have to do a pursuit!’ Stuff like that always appealed, I can’t explain why I love it, just that I do.”
Mark then showed that he loved everything about the history – the traditions for example and how tough it is. “It is such a beautiful sport with the elation and the toughness. When you hear the Italians and Belgians talking about it, I would not want to be doing anything else. Even when I am suffering in the mountains -- I love the mountains, I love suffering. Even if I am last, I still love it. That is part of our sport and that is why I train harder so I can suffer harder and I know it will be worth it”.
Scary Moments in the Tour
And suffer Mark did in the Tour de France. Asked what the scariest moment was for him, he picked stage 10 where he finished last with his faithful teammate Bernhard Eisel.
“That was a hard day. I crashed right at the beginning, a heavy crash and when I went down I thought I wasn’t going to get up to be honest. I did get up though and I started to chase and the commissaries put ‘a barrage’ on. This is when the commissaire stops the cars from overtaking you so you don't get any help. I was lucky the other team managers knew it was wrong to the put the barrage on me and they helped me out to get back on the peloton after a massive effort.”
“By the time I got on, the peloton was one long line because a break had gone up the road. After that it was a massive effort all day. As soon as it eased up, I went back to get some pain killers from the race doctor. I couldn’t hold the peloton on the Col du Tourmalet and Bernie waited for me and we rode to the finish. In the valley, it was a block headwind and we were riding and riding. You know when you have guys like Bernie with you, you are in a good team.”
“The group out front had six guys and there were two of us behind everybody in the race and we were going full gas trying to make the time limit. Days like that take so much out you its unbelievable. That was a scary day. I didn’t know we were going to make the time limit even though in the end we did it by a fair whack.”
Asked if next year he would rather only do one Grand Tour, Mark replied, “no, I’d like to do both. In hindsight maybe it would have been better to have finished the Tour de France this year and not the Giro but may be I’ll do that next year. I want to finish the Tour next year.”
He has his eye on a stage that is really huge for sprinters, the final one in Paris. “To win on the Champs Élysées is the second biggest race a sprinter can win – the biggest is the World Championships. My biggest sporting target in cycling is to be World Road Champion. Until I have done that, I have not fulfilled what I want to fulfil. I want that jersey. It’s the ultimate. I know I can win things like the Green jersey and other races, but the Worlds is such a lottery I have to make sure I win it.”
Mark adjusts the cleats on a pair of custom shoes made for him.
The School of Hard Knocks
Mark’s success is a far cry from his days as a Junior and then onto the academy as an under 23 rider. I told him one of my memorable photos was him as a junior winning a round of the Junior National Series in the West Midlands. He’d missed selection for GB for the Worlds and was out to prove a point.
Mark has a steely determination and while also quite tough, he wants success in cycling probably more than anybody I know. Now he has that success, he can afford to be a little cocky about how good he is because, one he is that good, and two, he worked dam hard to be this good – it wasn’t something that just happened overnight. He had to first make it through GB’s Olympic Academy for Under 23 riders.
The year 2004, January 12, is a date that sticks in Rod Ellingworth’s head as the time the Under 23 Academy came about. That first year Rod explained was more about putting in the ground work to get the structure right for the Academy and find the right riders who wanted to be professional cyclists.
“It was a decent group and Cav was always enthusiastic” Rod Ellingworth told me. “The days were hard but we brought cycling back into the group and it wasn’t just about performance and going round the track and doing times.”
Rod’s key element was discipline and to find riders who would commit 100 per cent. Mark certainly wanted it and one of Rod’s favourite stories is of a training day out in the hills south of Manchester. Now Mark, a little heavier back then, was never a great climber and this day on the bike was grim. It was raining and the period leading up to this day out in the hills had been hard as they still are being part of Rod’s infamous boot camps.
The climb was Gun Hill and Cav had had a hard day and been behind the car a lot after getting dropped on the climbs. “We got to the top of this climb” Rod told me “where we would normally regroup at the top. It was taking a while as we waited for Cav so I told them to carry on. I saw him coming up the hill, zig-zaging his way up, and then he got to the back of the car and I saw nothing!”
Didsbury, Manchester. First year of the GB Academy and Rod Ellingworth gives his riders a briefing of what lies ahead that day in the lanes of Cheshire .
“He had fallen off the bike and I got out of the car to see if he was alright and he was there crying, hurting and saying I won’t let you down, I’ll do this.”
“They are the moments when you say to yourself this guy wants it. Riders have to be able to be themselves -- it’s not about showing how hard you are. The best ones are the ones who use me to help them through their cycling. If they see me as a barrier or some one they have to show a front to, they will fail.”
“This job is 24-7. The first couple years I got upset with those who I was giving 100 percent to but was only getting 20 per cent back. Mark, Ed, and Geraint would never only give you a little bit back. Always 100 per cent. They realised I was totally on their side and in this job, you are either in or you are out.”
Reliving those days, Mark explained “it was tough but I keep reminding myself it was the best thing for me. I saw Melissa (his fiancée) 50 days a year and was living on three grand a year. I was a bit lucky in that I had worked in a bank and saved up my money so I was living a bit more kushti but it was all about hard work and discipline.”
“At the end of the day we were riding our bikes. I had worked in bank and I don’t think anyone else had worked so I knew what I could have been doing instead. That helped me so much more and so sure, it was hard but bike racing is hard. The bottom line was I was riding my bike and that is what I wanted to do.”
Those days Rod explained were part of a bonding period for those who went through the pain and nowadays, the former academy riders sit down laughing and joking about the days in the academy. Clashes between riders he said at the time were common but now they are the best of mates having been through a tough system.
“The thing about Mark” Rod explained “is he will go from race to race and not whinge about it because he loves cycling. If you don’t like living out of a suitcase and living abroad, you’re in the wrong game.”
Mark admits he owes the academy a lot and that the help he had there has brought him his success a lot quicker. Prior to the Academy, as a junior, he talks about not training properly and Rod says he, like so many then and now, were not organised in their lives. The Academy gave riders who managed to earn a place on it that structure, that organisation in their life.
And riders who think it’s an easy route to the top, think again. I’ve been to the track and seen riders doing three hours around and around and around the Velodrome as a punishment or outside washing cars. I can still remember setting off from the Velodrome after a track league to drive back to Warwickshire when it was snowing outside and seeing the Academy lads riding back to their house.
2003, seemingly an age ago and Mark is pictured winning a round (Solihull) of the Junior National RR Series.
When you next see Mark crossing the line and winning a major event, remember getting to that point has taken a lot of hard work. Mark has been there and that suffering and hard work has paid off. It doesn’t always work out as some former academy members will testify but who wants to go through life thinking ‘what if’.
Not Mark for one. As he explained in an article in the Guardian he could have stayed and worked his way up the ladder in his bank and be earning £24,000 a year. He didn’t. He took the option whereby he got very little money (and they still don’t get a lot!) but he did get his bike and taken to bike races and also got help from people on the Isle of Man to enable him to return home when he was allowed.
“My mentality is that you put all your eggs in one basket” Mark writes in the Guardian. “It's win or nothing, succeed or fail. In the past coaches seemed happy with silver medals, with being consistently good rather than winning. I don't want to be just consistent. I want to be the best.”
Mark being the best he can be has come full circle now for the Academy and his experiences are helping Rod make the academy become even better. “I think the most powerful thing is seeing what Mark has done” Rod explained. “He has a really good balance in life and it has been good to work with Mark after he left the academy because I have been able to bring new elements into the academy. With something like this, you have to change it all the time even though the structure remains the same.”
Now an established professional and far from those days as a junior, Mark is able to do his own training programmes whilst using Rod as a sounding board whilst for Rod, working with Mark is helping him bring new elements into the Academy for helping his graduates migrate from the Academy and into the pro scene.
Yellow jersey in the Tour of Romandy.
Feet on the Ground
For a rider gathering fans all the time, and a pay packet that us mere mortals can only dream about, how does he keep his feet on the ground. “As long as I know why I am earning good money and living a good lifestyle, I’ll keep my feet on the ground. I know I have to work hard and I can’t be a professional playboy. I have to be a professional cyclist and Rod is really good in helping me do that.”
“It would be easy enough for him to agree with what I say but he isn’t like that and is not scared to tell me straight if I’m messing around. That is the type of people I need around me.”
The final question was about next year. Will he be the type of rider who targets the Tour de France and only that or will he race all year round in the style of Eric Zabel?
“I don’t think going only for the Tour de France would be fair on the organisers of the other races and certainly not fair for my team and my teammates. If I am racing, I’m happy and I’ll try and win no matter when it is. As long as I am riding I’ll be fit and healthy. I get a massage and eat properly so for sure, I’ll be racing all the time”.
Note: The latest on the rumour mill is that former Credit Agricole rider, Aussie Mark Renshaw will be joining the team for 2009. Renshaw was the leadout man for Credit Agricole's sprinter Thor Hushovd in the 2008 Tour de France. Could Team Columbia be strengthening the team for Mark in 2009?
Good luck to Mark in Beijing.
Related Articles
Want to learn more about Mark? Here are some of the articles out there about him
Interview with Mark in June of this year
2007 July Interview in the Guardian
2008 July Interview in the Guardian
2007 July Mark Cavendish Blog in the Guardian