Sprinter Marcel Kittel has been suffering from illness all year and his Giant-Alpecin team decided he was not fit enough to ride the tour. - By AFP/Bicycling
Photo by Cor Vos, courtesy of Giant Bicycles
Marcel Kittel being forced out of the Tour de France due to a lack of fitness has several sprinters and their teams quietly grinning with delight. The last two years, Kittel has been in a class of his own at the Tour, winning four stages in each, including both the first and last on each occasion. He also got to wear the coveted yellow jersey both years as reward for his opening stage victory.
His raw power allowed him to beat the opposition every time he arrived at a finish in contention, even overhauling a spirited challenge from Alexander Kristoff on the Champs Elysees last year thanks to a simple advantage in pure speed. But Kittel has been suffering from illness all year and his Giant-Alpecin team decided he was not fit enough to ride the tour.
Chief among the relieved parties will likely be British rider Mark Cavendish, who won 25 Tour stages from 2008 to 2013 but crashed out of last year’s race on the very first stage. And since 2013, he has won only two sprint stages as Kittel had the edge on everyone. Cavendish is widely seen as the greatest natural sprinter ever, but the trend toward fewer flat pure sprinters’ stages at the Tour in favour or more rolling, hilly ones means that his hopes of claiming the green sprinter’s jersey have been greatly reduced.
He did win the green jersey outright in 2011, but the last three years it has been the personal property of Peter Sagan, a more all-round fast-man. The Slovak did not win a single stage last year but seemed always near the top, whether the stage was flat or rolling, and that allowed him to score enough points to easily claim the green ensured he easily claimed the green jersey.
via Bicycling » Tour de France http://ift.tt/1Ju4J5U
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