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Mark Cavendish's new team... (maybe)

Media report suggests one-year deal confirmed... even if team "denies" rumour...

The big news out of France is B&B Hotels – KTM could be Mark Cavendish's new team...

We say 'could' because just as the whispers spread through the media a spokesperson for the team denied the report and instead said all would be revealed at the team's official presentation on October 26th.

> "I've got a big year next year": Mark Cavendish hints at new team for 2023

I guess we'll know for certain in nine days' time, but the word from Ouest France appeared fairly strong, the French news outlet reporting the Manx Missile has agreed a one-year deal at the UCI ProTeam run by former pro racer Jérôme Pineau.

At the end of August, Pineau was upfront about his team's interest in Cav, calling the negotiations "quite complicated" but that there was a "50-50" chance.

In response to the Ouest France report, B&B Hotels – KTM told VeloNews: "We will make no comment on what came out today in Ouest-France, except denying all this information. We will unveil every detail about the team's future on October 26th."

So, what do we reckon? Deal off or building the expectation ahead of the big reveal next Wednesday?

Interestingly, Cavendish reportedly enlisted Sports Entertainment Group (SEG), a talent management agency, to find him a new team after it became apparent Patrick Lefevere was not going to offer him a new deal at Quick-Step Alpha Vinyl.

> "I know I'll win again": Mark Cavendish confident of 35th Tour de France stage win

Even more interestingly, three of SEG's riders — Nick Shultz, Cees Bol and Brit Stephen Williams — are supposedly joining the French team next year, while they're also linked with lead-out men Maximiliano Richeze and Ramon Sinkeldam. It seems someone's building a lead-out train — but who for?

The noise from the Netherlands is that Amazon France will be stepping in to help fund the project next year, with the team's name yet to be decided. Plenty of questions remain to be answered on October 26 in Paris. Oh, and did we mention the Tour de France route is revealed the day after? Yep, you guessed it... in Paris.

Dan is the road.cc news editor and has spent the past four years writing stories and features, as well as (hopefully) keeping you entertained on the live blog. Having previously written about nearly every other sport under the sun for the Express, and the weird and wonderful world of non-league football for the Non-League Paper, Dan joined road.cc in 2020. Come the weekend you'll find him labouring up a hill, probably with a mouth full of jelly babies, or making a bonk-induced trip to a south of England petrol station... in search of more jelly babies.

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mark1a | 1 year ago
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The brand value arising from whatever is on Cav's jersey at the finish line if/when he gets the record, which could stay out of reach for a long time. 

I'm surprised Specialized didn't put some pressure on LeFevre (maybe they did) to send him to the Tour this year, he has a long standing relationship with them, and are, after all, a marketing company that happens to sell bikes & accessories. Spesh did something similar when Tinkoff-Saxo folded, they then bankrolled a large part of Bora-Hansgrohe just to keep Peter Sagan and his entourage in the peloton. 

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timtak | 1 year ago
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Cav is such a big UK (mamil?) draw you'd think some UK company such as Wiggle, Chain Reaction, Ribble, Boardman, Falcon, rather than, or as well as, a French supermarket, would want to sponsor him.

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Rendel Harris replied to timtak | 1 year ago
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timtak wrote:

Cav is such a big UK (mamil?) draw you'd think some UK company such as Wiggle, Chain Reaction, Ribble, Boardman, Falcon, rather than, or as well as, a French supermarket, would want to sponsor him.

They'd have to sponsor an entire team and that means putting in a substantial share of a £30M+ budget, regrettably cycle racing in the UK just isn't popular enough to get a return on that sort of investment.

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James Warrener | 1 year ago
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I thought Carrefour already signed up as new sponsor for that team?

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Simon_MacMichael replied to James Warrener | 1 year ago
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That was certainly one rumour flying around at the end of the Tour de France, but not yet confirmed ... another is that it will be known as Paris Cycling Club, with backing from the city council (of course, there's a couple of large sports events happening in the French capital the year after next).

https://twitter.com/inrng/status/1550970075917815808

I guess we'll find out come the team presentation next week.

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