After the entire biking world, be that buddies, household or rivals, rejoiced as Mark Cavendish (Astana Qazaqstan) achieved a report thirty fifth stage win on the Tour de France in Saint Vulbas, maybe an important response was that of the nice Eddy Merckx.
Cycling’s all-time biggest rider was, in any case, the one man who had stood alongside Cavendish with a complete of 34 Tour wins earlier than yesterday’s history-making stage. Which was when the Manx Missile powered away from each the Tour’s dash discipline to victory and from Merckx for sole possession of the stage win report.
When Cavendish matched Merckx’s Tour de France stage win report of 34 in 2021, the entrance cowl ofL’Equipelearn “Le Cannibale du Sprint”. This morning, the French paper went merely with ‘Mark Cavendish The Cannibal’.
However, regardless of the French newspaper lending the Brit Merckx’s well-known nickname, there was solely respect from the 79-year-old who responded to the feat on social media.
“Congratulations to Mark Cavendish on this historic achievement! Such a pleasant man to interrupt my report,” stated Merckx on an Instagram story.
Merckx and Cavendish had been, in fact, vastly totally different of their strategies, with the Belgian nice taking wins throughout all stage varieties, be that mountain days or time trials, as he rode to the record-equalling complete of 5 Tour de France GC wins.
Cavendish was fast not solely to appropriate that it was “our report not his report” when requested to provide a message to Merckx, but additionally identified that 35 is only a quantity and nothing to take the shine away from males’s biking’s biggest rider of all time.
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“I really like Eddy, he’s at all times been tremendous good to me. It was our our report, not his report but it surely’s a quantity,” stated Cavendish to VTM Nieuws. “It’s not taking something from the nice Eddy Merckx, it’s only a quantity. Eddy Merckx is Eddy Merckx.”
Merckx stayed true to his phrase from 2021 that he would congratulate Cavendish, regardless of his timeless aggressive nature even nicely into retirement, beforehand stating to La Gazzetta dello Sport that he “received’t lose any sleep over it.”
And it is absolutely that shared uber-competitive nature that introduced him and Cavendish essentially the most full degree of success. The Manxman even being on the 2024 Tour de France at 39 is a testomony sufficient to his dedication to win, particularly in any case he has been by from critical sickness, despair and the crash and collarbone fracture on the 2023 Tour the place the thirty fifth appeared so far-off.
Cavendish and Merckx are actually separated on the high of the Tour stage win leaderboard, however the Manx Missile actually received’t be proud of only one now that he’s received it.
Today’s stage to Dijon is the primary shot at 36 and it’s a quantity the biking world hadn’t dared talk about… apart from Cavendish, clearly conscious of the extent he was at earlier than yesterday’s win, who was dreaming of “36, 37, even 40 levels” earlier than the race began. It wasn’t about beating Merckx to face alone however, because it at all times has been, successful itself.
Eddy Merckx congratulates Mark Cavendish on Instagram (Image credit score: Eddy Merckx/Instagram)
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