Record-breaking Tour de France stage winner has earned widespread admiration but also ruffled a few feathers

The seemingly bottomless drive that propelled Mark Cavendish past Eddy Merckx to hold the record for stage wins at the Tour de France outright has won him many admirers through his career. But it has also ruffled plenty of feathers among his rivals and sometimes even his own teammates.

His win in Saint-Vulbas on Wednesday that took him to 55 Grand Tour stages wins – 35 and counting at Le Tour, 17 in the Giro d’Italia and three in the Vuelta a España, earned plaudits around the world and a little bristling from some quarters in the peloton.

• Mark Cavendish blocked out in final stages of sprint
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The euphoria of Mark Cavendish’s record-breaking stage win on Wednesday’s fifth of the Tour de France proved short-lived, as 24 hours later Dylan Groenewegen reminded the world that other sprinters are also in the peloton.

Cavendish, who took a record-breaking 35th stage win in the Tour, was blocked out in the 300 metres of the sprint on the Cours Général de Gaulle in Dijon and could only watch as the Dutchman edged out Jasper Philipsen and the stage three winner, Biniam Girmay.

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Mark Cavendish’s record-breaking 35th stage win in the Tour de France was hailed by cycling’s great and good, especially as it came only days after he had almost been forced to quit this year’s race due to heatstroke.

In eclipsing the five-time Tour winner Eddy Merckx’s record of 34 stage wins, at 39, Cavendish, riding for the Astana Qazaqstan team, has confirmed his status as the greatest sprinter in the history of cycling.

• Cavendish victorious on stage five of this year’s race
• 39-year-old overtakes Eddy Merckx in history books
• In pictures: Cavendish’s greatest Tour stage wins

Mark Cavendish broke new ground in the Tour de France, becoming the most prolific stage winner in the history of the French race, as he took a record-breaking 35th victory with a typically instinctive sprint finish in Saint-Vulbas.

It may not have been as grand as the Champs Élysées, but when the moment came on the Avenue des Bergeries, in a suburban town better known for its boulodromes than for its sprint spectacles, the 39-year-old from the Isle of Man kept his date with destiny.

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Tadej Pogacar took victory in the first mountain stage of the 2024 Tour de France, from Pinerolo to Valloire, after breaking clear of the defending champion, Jonas Vingegaard, at the summit of the Col du Galibier.

“I wanted to hit hard today,” Pogacar said following the 12th Tour stage win of his career. “This was the plan and we executed it really well.”