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| Mark Cavendish holds collarbone in the tour de France crash that destroyed his yellow dream jersey.he waits to see if he will race on sunday. |
- Mark Cavendish balmes himself for tour de France crash
- Will be decided on sunday morning if he starts Sundays'r race
- Crash ends hope of Cavendish wearing yellow jersey for first time in career.
Mark Cavendish's crash destroyed his yellow jersey dream in Yorkshire.
Mark Cavendish’s future in the Tour de france is in the balance after his dream of wearing the first yellow jersey in his mother’s home town was shattered within sight of the line yesterday, as the sprinter slammed into the ground in a high-speed crash on the streets of Harrogate.
Perhaps the saddest part was watching Mark Cavendish, his face etched in pain and melancholy, being helped into an ambulance while his two-year-old daughter Delilah looked on. In her hand was a yellow flower. That was supposed to be Cavendish's colour(yellow jersey)when the Tour de France came to Yorkshire.
Instead, with a quarter-turn of a bike wheel and a sharpened elbow, the narrative was ripped up as Cavendish was flipped on the tarmac clutching his right shoulder. While an x-ray at Harrogate District hospital showed no broken bones, a later MRI scan revealed a shoulder dislocation and ruptured ligaments.
A decision on whether Cavendish will start Sunday’s second stage from York to Sheffield will be taken on Sunday morning but he is in a lot of pain and it does not look good. During the spring he had admitted that 2014 was “all about Harrogate”. If this injury does end his Tour those words will have proved prophetic – only not quite in the way the Manx man intended.
Speaking after the crash,Cavendish said : "I wanted to win, I felt really strong and was in a great position to contest the sprint thanks to the unbelievable efforts of my team. Sorry to all the fans that came out to support, it was truly incredible."
"I'm gutted about the crash," "It was my fault. I'll personally apologise to Simon Gerrans as soon as I get the chance. I tried to find a gap that wasn't really there."
Afterwards Cavendish admitted he was at fault for leaning into the Australian rider Simon Gerrans as they charged for the line and promised to apologise. His Omega Pharma-Quick Step cycling manager, Patrick Lefevere, concurred.
“Of course he was very impatient,” he said. “It’s his home tour, he was very focused, maybe too much focused. He was so sure to win that he probably did a mistake. Gerrans came next to him, slowed down, he wanted to get out, and he pushed with the shoulder and Gerrans pushed back with the shoulder and they crashed.”
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| Mark Cavendish in pain after tour de France crash at Harrogate. |
When the impact happened, 250m before the finish, the high-velocity cheers turned to gasps,
as if all the oxygen had been sucked from the sky. It took a little longer for the thousands squashed into Harrogate city centre to hear that Cavendish was among the fallen but, when they did, there was an uneasy silence. And when he trudged over the line, 3min 37sec behind the stage winner, Marcel Kittel, the party that had lasted 190.5km had ever so slightly been pooped.
But what a joyous party it was. Earlier in the day, before the sun(representing the yellow jersey) had squeaked out from the grey and the professionals were hogging the road, hundreds of thousands of people were squeezing into every potential vantage point. Along the route there were young boys and girls, veering this way and that, on bicycles and tricycles next to more seasoned club pros.
Others waited patiently, holding their union flags and French tricolors, for hours. Some had reimagined recumbents as pirate ships or given old bikes paint jobs and hung them from roundabouts. Garden chairs sat along the road, reserving spaces for when the riders dashed past.
There were yellow-painted sheep and llamas and plenty of yellow jerseys, too. Sometimes it seemed as if the whole county of the white rose had been dyed yellow.
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| Marcel Kittel gets the yellow jersey Cavendish was hoping for from the Duchess of Cambridge..Cavendish had crashed moments before the finishing line. |
At the pre-start neutralised section of the race, from Leeds city centre to Harewood House, Cavendish led out the peloton, smiling at the acclaim from a crowd later estimated by the Tour director, Christian Prudhomme, to be around two million people.
When they arrived at Harewood House the riders took their helmets off as the brass band played La Marseillaise, then God Save the Queen before the Duchess of Cambridge cut the white cord that marked the ceremonial start. As they rode out, Chris Froome and Alberto Contador were next to each other.
In the next three weeks they will attempt to destroy each other’s legs and spirit. For now they were content to exchange pleasantries. Later, as the riders went over Côte de Cray and the Côte de Buttertubs, the crowds were so close they could breathe on the peloton.
It could have been the Pyrenees or the Alps, not Heathcliff country. On the highest peaks of the Tour, the sight of El Diablo – a German man dressed in devil horns and carrying a spiky pitchfork – chasing after the riders has been a common occurrence.
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| The Duchess of Cambridge,Prince William and Prince Harry had all come to support Cavendish and hoped to see him get the yellow jersey.The crash put paid to all that! |
Yorkshire had a man, naked except for white underpants and long blue socks, attempting to do the same. Somehow it seemed appropriate.
Watching it all unfold was Prudhomme, who hailed what he called an “unbelievable and humongous” first day.
“Everywhere there is French flags, yellow flags, bunting, even a bicycle painted yellow on a crane at 30 metres high next to Millennium Square,” he said.
“I have had many dreams about the Tour Grand Départ in Yorkshire but it was greater than a dream.”
But not for Cavendish. He was still in contention 450m from the finish when the road arced steeply upwards but, as he went past Harrogate’s Turkish baths with 300m remaining, he was feeling the heat from Gerrans and Kittel.
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| Cavendish and the crash that cost him the yellow jersey! |
Then came the crash, which ended his hopes of wearing the yellow jersey for the first time in his professional career. At last year’s Tour he was fatigued by a virus and eclipsed by Kittel. That led some to fear that "Cavendish’s reign as the fastest sprinter of them all might be over". Sadly the spa town of Harrogate was unable to offer a tonic.
Earlier on Cavendish had remarked before the race that it will make his mother proud if he could claim the yellow jersey.
Cavendish said: “To think the first stage is in Yorkshire and finishes in my mother’s home town is exciting. I remember being in Harrogate many summers. My grandparents and my uncle still live here and it’s nice to look around the places I knew when I was young.
“It would also be nice to wear the yellow jersey. I’ve not yet done that but it’s not a given – there’s 200 bike riders, almost, on the start line and every one of those wants it.
“The Tour de France is 21 days long, it doesn’t begin and end in Yorkshire, but we have an incredibly strong team and want to succeed.”
excerpts from
the telegraph
the guardian
excerpts from
the telegraph
the guardian