Two wins in two days for Mark Cavendish (+ video)

Mark Cavendish, who took his first victory in more than three years yesterday at the Presidential Cycling Tour of Turkey has doubled up today, winning Stage 3 in Alanya to extend his overall lead in the race.

With the Deceuninck-Quick Step rider coming from the Isle of Man, which has annual rainfall well above the average for the British Isles, the expression “It never rains but it pours” springs to mind – back-to-back stage wins being as good a way as any to end such a long drought, with another flat stage tomorrow providing an opportunity for a hat-trick of victories.

Israel Start-Up Nation had dominated the leadout, working for Andre Greipel who had finished third behind Cavendish and Jasper Philipsen of Alpecin-Fenix yesterday.

Cavendish followed the German as he launched his sprint and, finding space to go past him, sped away to victory with Philipsen once again second and Stanisław Aniołkowski of Bingoal Pauwels Sauces in third place.

It was the 35-year-old's ninth career stage win at the race, although the size of the bunch of bananas he received today is rather smaller than the impressive one he was given in 2015.

How it started | How it's going#TUR2021 pic.twitter.com/8K9SXRfcwr

— La Flamme Rouge (@laflammerouge16) April 13, 2021

Here's what The Cycling Almanack posted to its Twitter page after Cavendish's long-awaited win yesterday ...

Huge comeback win for Mark Cavendish today in Turkey.

1,159 days since his last win at the 2018 Dubai Tour, 24,126km raced in between, equivalent to:

🌍 60% around Earth

🇨🇳 2.5x length of The Great Wall of China

🇺🇸 5.5x distance from LA to New York

A lesson in perservance 💪 pic.twitter.com/SjHBigvrML

— The Road Book (@CyclingAlmanack) April 12, 2021

... and here's what it posted today.

1 day, or 212km, since last win =

🏴󠁧󠁢󠁷󠁬󠁳󠁿 London to Cardiff

⚽️ 609 times around the Wembley pitch

🇮🇲 1.38 times around the Isle of Man

🚌🚌 https://t.co/3sOr4u3bI7

— The Road Book (@CyclingAlmanack) April 13, 2021

Is Merckx's record back on? In this kind of form, Cavendish could certainly be presenting his boss with a very nice problem to have going into the 2021 Tour de France...