Number 5 for Cavendish.

Cav wins again & leads Hushovd in again!

Thor Hushovd wears the Green Jersey as leader of the Sprint Classification, however even he must know deep down that he is not the best sprinter at the Tour. That honour lies with Mark Cavendish who claimed his 5th stage of this years race. Hushovd has not beaten the manxman once - in fact nobody has been able to beat Cavendish in a sprint a this tour, every single sprint he has contested, for stage wins or points at the head of the peleton, has been won by Cav. Last Saturday in Stage 13 Hushovd protested about Cavendish's tactics in the sprint - Cav was relegated, Hushovd got 13 points on his rival and a green jersey to wear.

Cavendish was reported to have told BBC Radio that Hushovd's green jersey will forever be stained because of that protest - He later denied he made such a remark.

On the seventeenth leg to Le Grand-Bornand, Hushovd went on a rampage through the Sallanches valley and cleaned up both intermediate sprints; looking towards the TV camera after the first, he tugged at his jersey, and appeared to say, ‘I earned it'. He collected 12 points in those intermediate sprints and his lead was out to 30 points.

So the lead is back to 25 after Cavs 5th stage win, if we subtract the 13 he earned when Cav was relegated and it would be back to 12 points. This comp would have been closer, but Hushovd would still be in green and would still be favourite for the sprint title. On the final stage there are 2 intermediate sprints (1,2,3 are awarded 6,4,2 points) and then the final sprint is awarded points 35,30,26,24,22. Hushovd has certainly proved himself the second best rider and it is very doubtful that Cavendish would get those points back anyway, but there will always be the questions.

The fact remains that the best sprinter does not always win the Green Jersey, Erik Zabel won 6 of them and collected 12 stages in 14 tours - he was not the best sprinter but he was the most consistent, was always in the finish and he was able to get himself intermediate sprints. Much like Cavendish here he is unbeatable in a sprint, he has 9 stages in 2.5 tours and will make it 10 on the final day. I posted a rant about how good he is earlier in the tour - view it here.

Cav was gracious in victory though, he said afterward "That was humiliating for me the other day (referring to Thors solo escape in Stage 17) that was a beautiful ride by Thor, He's shown he's fought for that jersey, he's not just been put in that position. If anybody deserves to be in Paris with that, it's him. Somebody who's fought for the jersey like that, I can't compete with that – I said it to him the other day."

Columbia HTC decided that this was a sprinters stage, even though none of the experts and commentators thought so. The breakaway was 20 men, it never got more than 3 minutes away and Cav was able to master the final 14km cat 2 climb without to much trouble, Columbia reeled in the few who slipped away on the descent and then Cav just did what he does best - win.

"I got a bit carried away when I was in green, but I've gone back to my original plan now – I just want stage wins," said Cavendish.

He's got one more chance left.