The destination is the same as ever it was for Mark Cavendish, but there’s no harm in opting for a different route now and then. Cycling keeps changing, after all. For the results in July to stay the same, a degree of adaptation has been necessary over the years.
With that in mind, Cavendish has opted for a novel prelude to this, his 19th season in the WorldTour. He has already spent the past three weeks in Colombia undertaking the most extended stint of altitude training of his entire career, and on Tuesday, he begins his campaign some 2,500m above sea level at the Tour Colombia.
Cavendish and an Astana Qazaqstan contingent that includes Michael Mørkøv, Cees Bol and his coach Vasilis Anastopoulos arrived in Colombia on January 15. After a week or so in Rionegro, training with a police escort to navigate the heavy traffic in the hinterland of Medellín, they moved to higher ground in Boyacá, the site of the Tour Colombia’s opening three stages.
“I can’t believe it after so many years, but it’s my first time in Colombia. I want to stay,” Cavendish said at the pre-race press conference on the shores of Lake Sochacota on Monday. “We spent a week in Medellin, which was incredible, and then we came up here to Paipa. The only problem was I couldn’t breathe for two weeks. But now I understand why the riders from Colombia just play with us when they come down to sea level.”
Cavendish explained that he had no real frame of reference for gauging how well he had adapted to the rarefied air during his time in Colombia. “It’s hard to compare when it comes to adaptation because I’ve never really done altitude before,” he said. The opening stage to Duitama should offer some indication. Although the town’s name is forever redolent of that most arduous 1995 World Championships course, the route on Tuesday lends itself to a bunch finish.
The expectation is that Cavendish will vie with Fernando Gaviria (Movistar) for victory, but the Manxman knows only too well that racing in South America against a motivated peloton of Continental riders can produce surprises. A teenaged Gaviria, after all, announced himself to the world by beating Cavendish at Villa Mercedes on the opening day of the Tour de San Luis back in 2015.
“With regards to the sprints, I don’t know,” Cavendish said. “We’ve got a very strong team, and I know Fernando has a strong team with Movistar too. But like we’ve seen with the road championships in Colombia, there are a lot of domestically based riders who…
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