Take a deep sigh of relief, because it’s finally over. Those blurred videos of a Cav-like figure zooming by on Spanish roads, creepy paparazzi photos of him loading a bike into the back of a team car, cryptic Tweets and speculative news articles (guilty), can all be put to rest. Mark Cavendish has finally, thank goodness, officially announced he will be riding for Astana Qazaqstan in 2023.
The road to get here has been long. It’s one with so many twists and turns, from a near-confirmed signing to the now-defunct B&B Hotels team, to rumours about a contract with Human Powered Health or the new Q36.5 Team, to the 2023 Astana Qazaqstan team photo without Cavendish himself in it at the end of last year, to the official team announcement finally coming incredibly close to the season starting. We might need a lie down.
But although it has been easy to get caught up in the drama and intrigue surrounding Mark Cavendish’s transfer to Astana, the signing of the contract is really only the very first step in the agreement between the two parties – the tricky part is still to come. The Kazakh team now needs to get its return on the likely hefty investment it has put into bringing Cavendish to the outfit. The picture of him winning that elusive 35th Tour de France stage and bettering Eddy Merckx’s record in an Astana jersey is likely one that team manager Alexander Vinokourov dreams of when he closes his eyes at night, but it’s not going to be an easy road to get there.
With sprightly young talent like Fabio Jakobsen (Soudal – Quick-Step) and Jasper Philipsen (Alpecin-Deceuninck) – to name just a few – hungry for big wins, it’s only getting harder each year to be the best sprinter in the world. Cavendish himself proved with the four stage wins he got at the 2021 Tour de France how important a good lead-out train is, and said how crucial it was to have the full belief of his then team, Deceuninck – Quick-Step, behind him. Astana have given Cav a snazzy new national champions jersey, and managed to fork out the budget to meet his demands, but can they create the team around the Manxman that he’ll need to win bike races?
From the perspective of Astana Qazaqstan, Cavendish could be their saviour in a period of crisis. The team fired their talented Colombian climber, Miguel Ángel López, at the end of 2022 due to what the team claimed was the discovery of “new elements” showing López’s “probable connection” with Dr Marcos…