The Tour de France’s main sprinter Jasper Philipsen has backed Mark Cavendish to win a record-setting thirty fifth stage throughout this 12 months’s race, saying that the entire sport is prepared on the Briton.
Philipsen gained the race’s inexperienced jersey and 4 levels in 2023, and is broadly anticipated so as to add to his tally of six profession stage wins within the forthcoming weeks.
As much as eight levels of the 2024 race seem like reserved for the sprinters, and Cavendish, 39, solely wants one win to develop into the outright stage race report holder; he at present holds the title with Eddy Merckx on 34.
Talking two days earlier than the race will get underway within the Italian metropolis of Florence, Alpecin-Deceuninck’s Philipsen mentioned: “Everyone desires to see Mark win a thirty fifth stage. I’ve at all times been an enormous fan of Mark Cavendish and it could be a historic second if he can attain it.”
On stage seven of final 12 months’s Tour, Cavendish appeared set to win, solely to be crushed by Philipsen. A day later, Cavendish crashed out of the race with a damaged collarbone.
The primary day that’s slated to go the way in which of the sprinters is the third stage that finishes in Turin, earlier than an additional three alternatives forward of the primary relaxation day.
Philipsen’s principal rivals are anticipated to be Belgian nationwide champion Arnaud De Lie (Lotto-Dstny) and Dylan Groenewegen (Jayco-AlUla), however he’s additionally anticipating a powerful Cavendish, regardless of the Manxman solely successful three races in his 18 months driving for Astana-Qazaqstan.
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“He shall be good and there [in contention] for certain,” Philipsen mentioned. “[But] it’s not that I’m going to be making a gift of a dash. We are going to attempt to do our greatest and try to beat him.”
Philipsen gained March’s Milan-Sanremo however has been repeatedly crushed in stage races all through the season, though principally in opposition to two riders not current on the Tour: Soudal-QuickStep’s Tim Merlier and Lidl-Trek’s Jonathan Milan.
Requested if he can pinpoint why he hasn’t been as constantly quick, Philipsen mentioned: “As a result of the opposite guys are tremendous and never gradual. We additionally targeted loads on the Classics – we had success in Milan-Sanremo – and we weren’t focusing loads on sprinting.
“I’m anticipating from myself that I’ll be sprinting sooner in the course of the Tour de France which needs to be the plain purpose. However after all different guys may even count on the identical.”
The large weapon in Philipsen’s armoury is reigning world champion Mathieu van der Poel. The Dutchman has develop into an important member of Philipsen’s leadout prepare in current instances, and with Van der Poel not anticipating to be in rivalry for a lot of stage victories himself, he shall be dedicating his providers to his teammate.
“Mathieu is somebody that not many different groups have, or no different workforce the truth is, so it’s one thing vital for our workforce,” Philipsen mentioned.
“It was a very good how we managed to do the sprints final 12 months. But when there are circumstances and we’ve got to innovate with out Mathieu, we are able to do it. We will adapt to any state of affairs to have maximal energy in a dash stage.”
