BRITISH cycling star Mark Cavendish has been preparing for tomorrow’s Road World Championships in Doha by spending “several hours” a day in the sauna.
The temperature forecast for the 257.5-kilometre race through the Qatari desert is 36C – probably not hot enough to trigger a reduction in the race distance on safety grounds but enough to melt an under-prepared challenge.
Cavendish, who arrived in Doha from his Tuscany training base on Monday, had to take a week off the bike earlier this month after a gastrointestinal illness he thinks he picked up during the Tour of Britain.
But the 31-year-old Manxman is now recovered and in good spirits as he goes for the final goal he set earlier this year: making the British Olympic track team, winning the opening stage of the Tour de France to wear the yellow jersey for the first time, an Olympic medal and a second world road race title.
It seemed ambitious, even unlikely, at the time, particularly as some in the sport thought his best days were behind him, but Cavendish comes to this race as the favourite for good reason after a campaign that has surpassed even those lofty targets.
Olympic selection was sealed with victory in the two-man madison with Sir Bradley Wiggins at the track world championships, he followed that first-stage win at the Tour with three more to take his total to 30 and he then claimed a silver medal in the omnium at Rio 2016.
Victory on Doha’s artificial island the Pearl would cap his best year since winning the 2011 world title in Copenhagen and make him the first rider in the modern era to win a world champion’s rainbow jersey on the track and road in the same season.
Cavendish said: “I’m not really thinking about that now: I just really want to win this race. I want to be world champion again.I will reflect properly on everything else at the end of the year.” imely.
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