Mark Cavendish hits the best form just ahead of the Tour de France
Mark Cavendish bagged the first overall victory of his career at the Ster ZLM Toer on Sunday, after he overcame the in-form Lars Boom and Jurgen Roelandts.
The British cyclist is having a terrific season and an overall victory was the only trophy missing on his resume.
He completed the four-day race in a total time of 16 hours, 11 minutes and 55 seconds and managed an overall lead of 8 seconds on Lars Boom of Team Rabobank.
Jurgen Roelandts of Team Lotto Belisol finished further 6 seconds behind at the third spot while Juan Antonio Flecha of Team Sky and Giacomo Nizzolo of Team RadioShack-Nissan achieved the fourth and the fifth positions respectively.
“I've been second a couple of times in the past but this is my first GC win and I'm really, really happy with it," Mark noted.
"The team rode so well yesterday, setting such a high tempo on the front that guys were going out the back all day".
"We were down to just 25 at the finish - it was incredible and I'm really proud of what we did".
Cavendish also earned the green jersey during the second and the third stages of the race and grabbed the second overall spot after the point’s classifications.
"In today's final stage there was a dangerous guy up the road in the break at just one minute back on the GC but we managed to bring it all back together”.
The 27-year-old bagged six stages in the season already including two at the Tour of Qatar, one at the Tirreno-Adriatico and three stages at the Giro d’Italia 2012.
Mark’s overall victory came just in time and with Tour de France around the corner he is definitely a pre-race favourite for the second Grand Tour race of the season.
The cyclist noted that his training for the Tour de France and the London Olympics are on track and is hopeful with his team’s top performance at the most prestigious cycling race of the year.
The 2012 version of the French Grand Tour is scheduled from June 30 to July 22 which will take the cyclists through a gruelling distance of 3,496.9 kilometres across the beautiful terrains across Europe.
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