TdF Files: Cav’s Catch-22

The conundrum that Mark Cavendish faces in his quest to win his first green jersey may well be inhibiting his ability to win stages as easily as he used to, writes Anthony Tan from Carmaux.

Cavendish is a whinger So… Mark Cavendish is beatable, after all. And despite what some people said before today, André Greipel is not intimidated by his former team-mate-turned-foe.

It's noteworthy that I had a intriguing conversation today in Carmaux with Jean-François Quénet, a veteran French cycling journalist, who is on his twenty-second Tour de France. Among many things, we discussed the green jersey competition and Cavendish's potential to win it.

In an interview to be podcast on Cycling Central this week, I asked Quénet about Cavendish's reply to my question four days ago in Châteauroux, where he took his second scalp of the race and his seventeenth Tour stage victory.

In a nutshell, Cavendish said that, "the biggest hindrance to [winning] the green jersey is just the lack of absolute bunch sprints. The change in the points is kind of indifferent – it's neither here nor there – it's the lack of absolute bunch sprints that will hinder my progress."

The Manxman added that the green jersey classification suits a more attacking-style rider, such as the two who currently precede him on the points leaderboard, Philippe Gilbert (Omega Pharma-Lotto) and José Joaquin Rojas (Movistar), on 226 and 209 points, respectively.

"Cavendish is a whinger," Quénet began by saying.

"The new regulation has been made for Cavendish. That's what they said at the Tour de France presentation [last year in Paris]. They didn't say they made the new rules for Cavendish, but everyone interpreted the new rules, saying, 'Oh, that's better for Cavendish', because Cavendish was winning six stages of the Tour [in 2008] but still not winning the green jersey.

"The good thing about the new regulation is that it has opened the green jersey to more riders than before," said the Frenchman, who added that that just because the classification now favours Cavendish more, does not make it a done deal.

"In the past few years, let's say a maximum of three riders could target the green jersey. And the green jersey is not the jersey for the best sprinter – the green is the jersey for the points classification. And points are for all stages. And stages that allocate the biggest number of points are the stages for sprinters, so Cavendish shouldn't complain about that."

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The catch for Cavendish, however, is that in order to win the competition for green, he must go not just for stage wins – for the pure sprinter, there are no more than six available in this year's race – but the intermediate sprints as well.

"This is the situation at the Tour de France: [the sprinters] have to make a choice," said Qu̩net, "and maybe Cavendish is not able to sprint twice a day. He's for sure the best sprinter in the world right now for once a day Рbut now he has to sprint twice a day.

"He doesn't give [the intermediate sprints his] all. I can see him sprinting at these hot-spot sprints… he saves some energy for the rest of the race – he doesn't sprint full-gas for hot-spot sprints like the finishes. And he's right to do so, because otherwise he may not be able to sprint at all at the finish."

As Tuesday's tenth stage showed, Cavendish is keen to contest the intermediate sprints, where he picked up another nine points, winning the sprint behind the six-man early breakaway, and was led out by none other than his lieutenant ever-faithful, Mark Renshaw.

But in doing so, it may have cost him his punch when sprinting against Greipel in the finale, as the hulk of a German kicked out hard off Cav's wheel – who perhaps jumped a tad too early – and surprised him with a preternatural burst of speed.

Interestingly, Greipel, who is some way down the points classification in sixth place, on 123 points to Cavendish's 197, did not bother at all with the intermediate sprint prime Tuesday, saving all his energy for his first Tour de France stage win. "This is one of the – no, this is the greatest moment on my bike," Greipel said, adding: "This is one of the best moments of my life, after the birth of my two daughters."

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"[The situation] could be even worse for him," Quénet said of Cavendish's standing on the points classification, and what he has to do to win the jersey he so desperately covets.

"Because if you go to the Tour of Spain or the Tour of Italy, the number of points for the points classification is the same for every stage – whether it's a flat stage or a mountain stage. And at the Giro, some years you have [Alessandro] Petacchi winning the points classification and another year you have Cadel Evans. The [points] jersey is more for sprinters at the Tour de France than any other Grand Tour.

"Okay, looking at the classification now, it makes it a bit complicated for Cavendish to win it. He can still win it. But it's up to him to adjust his tactic to his goals, and he has to know what his goals really are… he can't have everything. He can't have all the stage wins and the green jersey.

"He wants a lot of glory," said Quénet. "But if he wants everything he has to win everything."

Or, could it simply be that Cavendish is not as speedy as he once was?

In a Twitter poll I conducted straight after Tuesday's stage, I asked the question: "Is Cavendish as quick as he was in 2008/9? Yes or no?"

75 percent of you answered 'No' – that Cavendish is no longer as fast as he used to be.

Follow Anthony on Twitter: @anthony_tan