100% British, 100% clean

It’s great news that Britain’s Mark Cavendish and Roger Hammond have been named in T-Mobile’s preliminary Tour de France squad.

With fellow Brits Bradley Wiggins and David Millar among the favourites for bagging the London prologue, it could be a very British start to the first week of the Tour de France.

After the time trial prologue the first few stages are usually won by sprinters, and Mark Cavendish is on top form at the moment.

Here’s a helicopter shot of the final sprint of the Scheldeprijs one-day race in Belgium, held in April:


Cavendish beat world-class sprinters like Robbie McEwen to grab that victory and it would be surprising if T-Mobile didn’t choose the Isle of Man rider in its final nine. T-Mobile’s Head of Sport Management Rolf Aldag has choose nine from the following thirteen riders:

Lorenzo Bernucci (Italy), Marcus Burghardt (Germany), Mark Cavendish (Great Britain), Bernhard Eisel (Austria), Andreas Klier (Germany), Linus Gerdemann (Germany), Bert Grabsch (Germany), Giuseppe Guerini (Italy), Roger Hammond (Great Britain), Kim Kirchen (Luxembourg), Axel Merckx (Belgium), Michael Rogers (Australia) and Patrik Sinkewitz (Germany).

To date only Michael Rogers is guaranteed a place.