Boy Racer

by Mark Cavendish

  I waited.

  Finally, there was a crackle, then the sound of Allan's voice.

  'Er, Cav, mate, afraid we don't have any 808s in the car ...'

  The first thing to say was that it was an uncharacteristic mistake. My team prides itself on its organisation and professionalism and that begins, rather than ends, with the backroom staff. The soigneurs, mechanics and managers are the unsung heroes in what has been a huge success story since Bob and Rolf started running the team.

  Right, now that's out of the way. Now I can be honest: I went apeshit. The excuse given was that it was a hilly stage and therefore far from certain to finish in a bunch sprint. Oh yeah? So does that also mean you get rid of the smoke alarms in your house because there haven't been many fires recently? Am I being unfair when I say – and later said to the mechanic in question – that if I'm killing myself to get over a climb, if I'm willing to waste valuable energy to drop back to the car, change wheels and chase to give myself and my team a shot at a stage win, the least he can do is provide the tools that will maximise my chances of succeeding?

  As we all know now, all's well that ended well. After another couple of mishaps, I won my second Tour stage on the wrong, less stiff and less aerodynamic Zipp 404 wheels, and the incident gave Allan a good story to tell whenever he's asked to describe what makes me different from most riders. Many, if not most, Allan would probably tell you, wouldn't have even bothered asking for that wheel change; and if they had and been told what I was told, they'd have shrugged or cursed under their breath or ranted to the nearest available rider about the 'crap mechanics on our team'.

  My reaction was emotive, aggressive, but ultimately rational and constructive. Allan would also tell you that it erased any doubt in his mind about who was going to win that eighth stage.

  IT'S FUNNY how memory works. Writing this book, I amazed myself at the recollection I had of some races, stretching right back into my teens. First race as an Under 16? Easy – circuit race in Saltayre, near Lancaster: I attacked after 200 metres, lapped the field twice and won on my own.

  As the years and seasons tick by, no doubt some of these images might become a little foggier, but there are some races that I'll never forget. The four stage wins in the 2008 – it goes without saying – but there may be one memory that trumps even them. They say you always remember your first love, right? I can guarantee that your first win as a professional cyclist is almost as special and every bit as memorable.

  If you'd asked me back in February 2007 whether I'd win one professional cycle race – let alone four in a single Tour de France – I'd probably have hesitated. My instinct might have said 'yes' but my body 'no'. As the weeks went by, as I lay in bed in the Isle of Man, trying to recover, a growing pile of emotional wreckage was starting to obscure that knowledge.

  Finally, at the end of February, I'd been able to start training. At the beginning of March, I'd started competing. A minor Belgian one-day race, the GP Samyn had been my comeback race. I'd finished, but with difficulty. Same thing next time out, in a stage race called the Three Days of West Flanders, then again in the Three Days of De Panne. De Panne was savage; I got my head kicked in – there are no other words for it. One stage was well over 200 kilometres – too far and too hard for me to finish in my still pretty precarious physical condition. But finish I did. Half-dead.

  Within the next fortnight, one of my teammates, Marcus Burghardt, would give the team a massive morale-boost by winning the Ghent–Wevelgem semi-classic ahead of Roger Hammond. My form and spirits were also improving. At the GP Pino Cerami, another of the hectic, hilly Belgian races which come thick and fast in March and April, I even finished in the front group. Two days later, I had the time of my life, recceing the final 130 kms of the Paris–Roubaix route with the lads who were selected to ride that race the following Sunday. That day I did two training sessions – one to Roubaix with the rest of the team, then an extra 130 kilometres when the cyclo-tourist who was supposed to lead me back to the team hotel from Roubaix casually slipped in, an hour or so after we set off, that my hotel was in the completely opposite direction. I ended up arriving back at the hotel with daylight fading and my fingers and thumbs bleeding from the battering they'd taken on the cobblestones which give Paris–Roubaix its nickname – 'The Hell of the North'.

  The only 'Hell' on my mind that night was how the 'hell' my callused hands and aching legs were going to heal in time for my next race – the Grote Scheldeprijs in five days' time.

  SO WHERE did we leave it? Memories, right? Memories of races. Why some races stand out as bold and solid as sculptures and others seem to fade away.

  It maybe won't surprise you to learn that I often get flashbacks of sprint finishes, especially those that I won. There's a difference, though, between the memories that come spontaneously and those that have to be deliberately recalled and reconstructed. Don't ask me why but that difference definitely exists: there are some races and some sprints that are still stuck in my body, under my skin, and others that survive only in my mind.

  Weirdly, the eighth stage of the Tour de France is the only one of my four stage wins that fits into the second category. I say weirdly because it also happens to be the one that my teammates still talk about, laugh about, rave about. Me, I just don't remember it like I remember the other three.

  One theory I have considered is that I don't remember it because I didn't see it very well. Ironically, given the roasting I gave our mechanic over the wheels, I also could have cost myself and the team that day by choosing the wrong lenses for my Oakley sunglasses. That morning the forecast had been pretty mixed, so it followed that I should go for a pair of lenses that catered for every type of condition. I chose 'transition' lenses, i.e. the ones whose tint varies according to the light. Big mistake: as we came into the final five kilometres, the rainwater on the road created a glare which 'tricked' my lenses into turning as dark and impenetrable as the eyemasks they hand out on long-haul flights. I could have done without, except that, when I'm sprinting, I'm so low over the handlebars – lower than pretty much any other sprinter – that, on a wet day, spray from my front tyre flies into my eyes and blinds me.

  I ended up putting the glasses back on with around two kilometres to go. From behind the darkened lenses, I could see little more than flashes of colour and action: Lövkvist taking over from Burghardt 2200 metres out, a bridge with a kilometre to go, a corner at 800 metres – the kind of corner I'd usually attack at full-throttle, but I crept around that day in the rain; Gerald Ciolek starting the lead-out at 500 metres, me three wheels behind, sprinting in the centre of the road, winning, then seeing Gerald's face after the finish. He was happy, but also, I sensed, wondering what it meant if he was burying himself for me and still finishing second. After the stage, in the press conference, I didn't have to remind myself to talk up Gerald or say how proud it made me that we'd finished first and second; deep down, without admitting it to anyone, I was thinking that Gerald shouldn't have to ride another Tour de France at a teammate's beck and call.

  COULD two sprinters ever function harmoniously in the same team? If their names were Cavendish and Ciolek then Stage 8 of the Tour de France proved that the answer was an emphatic 'yes'.

  Okay, so now let's try the same question but change one of the riders: how about if their names were Cavendish and Greipel?

  I dare say that Allan Peiper was asking himself the same thing on the afternoon of 17 April 2007. That day, Allan picked me up from Roger Hammond's flat and we headed for a hotel near Antwerp, where the next stop on my comeback trail, the Grote Scheldeprijs, would start the next day. On the way, inevitably, the conversation turned to races in the previous couple of months and to Andre Greipel. I mentally chalked up a couple of brownie points when Allan told me I was looking 'lean and fit'.

  We drove to Antwerp the next morning. Pretty early in a pro career, you can become matter-of-fact about even relatively prestigious races, but that apathy is never likely to affect me. The onl
y thing I felt was excitement – and nerves. I'd set off for the race with Allan the previous day barely even able to pronounce or spell Scheldeprijs, let alone talk to you about its importance; now, before the race, I had my teammate Servais Knaven telling me that he'd won here ten years ago and that, to local fans, it was like a Cup Final. Servais also said that it was an ideal race for me. Within the space of a few minutes, I went from a feeling of mild curiosity to a chest-thumping adrenalin high.

  I knew what Allan was going to say in the briefing: if the race came down to a sprint finish, which it did roughly every second year, our main man would be André Greipel. I didn't even flinch. I was learning fast that there were some things it just wasn't worth arguing about.

  I can usually give you a fairly good idea of how I'm feeling and how the race will go within a few kilometres of the start. That day, just as I would in Stage 5 of the 2008 Tour de France, I felt amazing and made sure everyone in my team knew about it all through the day.

  It was the kind of racing I loved – wind howling, breaks going, cobbles jarring, and a pace so fast that the soigneurs hadn't made it from the start in Antwerp to the feedzone in time to hand out our lunchpacks or 'musettes'. This actually played in my favour, as Rod had taught us at the Academy that the only people we should rely on for food in races were ourselves. Over the years, I'd devised my own personalised 'meals on wheels' system which meant that, while other riders would carry maybe the odd energy bar then collect the rest of their food at the feed-zone, I had everything I needed stuffed into my jersey pocket. My rule was that I needed one item for every 20 kilometres. I'd work back from a sachet of caffeine gel with 20 kilometres to go and 40 kilometres to go, normal gels at 60, 80, 100 and 120, and the rest would be energy bars. Each gel or bar would have a designated place in the three pockets in the back of my jersey: the middle pocket for the bars, the right-hand pocket for the normal gels and the left-hand pocket for the caffeine gels. The logic was that not only did I more or less balance the weight in both pockets, but more importantly, I wouldn't have to risk taking my right hand off the bars to reach for a caffeine gel in the last 40 kilometres, when I might be forced to brake and skid at any time.

  The British Cycling Federation Performance Director Dave Brailsford is forever talking about how 'the aggregation of marginal gains' is often the difference between good and excellent, winning and losing. That day at Scheldeprijs, as I watched panic turn to pandemonium when riders reached the feedzone and didn't see their soigneurs, I could see exactly what Dave B was on about.

  Earlier I mentioned the 'magic' of form; unfortunately, while many have tried, it's almost impossible to convey just what a euphoric sensation it is to feel your body in a state of total grace, almost as if you're on a higher physical plane, where power and speed are effortless, and pain ... almost painless. I say it's impossible to convey; there may be no other cyclist in Britain who can talk with authority about winning sprints in the Tour de France but there may be hundreds of thousands if not millions who have experienced that magic. You can't buy it, but you can earn it; over several weeks, you build gradually towards it yet it appears suddenly and disappears just as quickly; you can be fit or strong for fifty-two weeks of the year, but, at the very most, if you're very lucky, experience two five-week bursts of 'magic'. As a professional cyclist, your whole life and training schedule revolve around making those five magic weeks coincide with the biggest races, your biggest objectives.

  Now the magic had come from nowhere, as it always does. I'd spent the entire day near the front of the bunch, marking breaks, ducking and diving, yet my legs kept coming back for more.

  Scheldeprijs finishes with three laps of a 20 km circuit; Servais Knaven had told me everything I needed to know. We entered the final lap and Allan buzzed in for a few last checks.

  'Cav, still feeling good, mate?'

  'Amazing.'

  'Okay, everyone on the team ride for Greipel, except Cav; Cav, just do your own thing, okay? So Greipel, you've got everyone working for you except Cav.'

  I felt a surge of adrenalin. Allan was giving me my first chance, my first real chance. In one sense I'd already won ... but I could also lose: I may not have had the responsibility that comes when a whole team's at your disposal, but I did have the pressure which I'd brought upon myself with my none-too-subtle self-promotion.

  It was easy really: I just mustn't blow it. Yeah, right, easy – with no teammates to count on – really easy. With three kilometres to go, I was still coping well, on the Belgian rider Jos Pronk's wheel, and even showing a bit of my mettle: at the 2.5 kilometre mark, the road chicaned and Robbie McEwen tried to muscle into the line. I held my ground. Robbie bounced off. Robbie McEwen is indisputably one of the best sprinters of the past fifteen years and not a man to be messed with on or off the bike. I barely knew him back then; when we talked about our little tussle later, he paid me a huge compliment: 'My God, you showed some balls there ...'

  I really thought it was all over for me at the 2 km mark. It would have been, had it not been for Bernhard Eisel. Since that day, Bernie has given me many reasons to thank him, but nothing will ever make me forget the moment when, on the way out of a corner with two kilometres to go – cut up, unclipped from one of my pedals, desperately out of position, Bernie nodded at me to follow his wheel. Bernie was rapidly dropping through the peloton, spent from his work for Greipel, yet for some reason, somehow, something possessed him when he saw me. 'Come on, buddy,' was all he needed to say.

  Now it was all down to me.

  One and a half to go. We're moving up, we're moving up. Inside the top twenty, top ten, Bernie you're my hero. Who's that? Greipel. Concentrate, Cav. Keep moving. Past Greipel. Still top ten. Bernie's gone but you're okay. Good, Cav, good.

  One-point-two. One-point-one. Fuck. Oh no. You're boxed in. How did that happen? You're boxed, you're boxed, there's nothing you can do ... You're going for a place here, 900, 800, you're still boxed, 700 ... No! Quick step! Weylandt! Get on it, Cav. It's Wouter Weylandt – he's leading out Steegmans. Yes. You're on it, you're on it ... Steegmans, behind Weylandt, and Steegmans is going he's going, he's going, he's gone and now it's you and him Cav, it's you, and your legs feel like a pair of rocket launchers, it's you and him, this is it, this is your chance, 100 to go, 50, here it fucking comes and here it is and here it fucking is and YES! YES! YES! YES! YESSSSSSS! TICK BOOM, TAKE THAT YOU BEAUTY ...

  I'd fucking won! I'd only gone and fucking won.

  As ever, I came over the line screaming, punching the air, emotions all over the show, but really thinking just one thing: that I wanted to see my teammates. Above all, I wanted to see Bernie. Ironically, the commentator on the live broadcast in Belgium had seen a rider in a magenta T-Mobile jersey come over the line in first place and shouted 'Eisel!!!' I later found out that nearly two million people had been watching the race on TV ... on a Wednesday afternoon.

  I saw Bernie. Hugged him. Hugged him so hard he almost needed neck surgery. I hugged everyone. I even hugged Greipel. That wasn't quite so heartfelt, and neither was the expression on his face when told me 'congratulations'.

  The next hour, two hours, three hours, were great. As I mentioned earlier, at the Tour, a post-race press conference is normally the last place you want to be when you've just won, but that day the journalists were in danger of missing their deadlines, so long and so happily did I ramble on. Not that they minded – in fact, some of them looked as happy and excited as I did.

  The text messages, the podium, the phone call to Melissa, the phone call from Aldag, from Brian – it was everything that I'd expected and much, much more. A couple of weeks earlier I'd been lying in bed, despairing for my health and, to a certain extent, my future as a pro cyclist. Now, I was standing on the podium with one of the greatest sprinters in the world, Robbie McEwen, on my right-hand side and 10,000 people in front of the stage, all thinking and saying the same thing: 'So this is the new kid on the block ...'

  There were so many t
hings to do, so many people to talk to. Most importantly, there were people to thank. Above all of them there was Bernie Eisel.

  'Mate, I couldn't have done that without you. Thank you so, so, so much ...' I told Bernie as I did my rounds of the rooms that evening, telling everyone – even Greipel – how grateful I was.

  'Don't worry, I was fucked anyway ...' he shrugged.

  If I was almost overwhelmed, Bernie's reaction epitomised the bloody-minded generosity that, just over a year later, would keep me in the Tour de France.