Cavendish to OPQS

If you look in my signature,
If you look in my signature, you’ll see a link to the transfer thread, but not to be filled with gossip.

Its my understanding aswell that JTL has signed for Saxo. But as Saxo as not naming any signing till the end of the calender, we’ll have to wait and see

I think he was training with
I think he was training with the ‘GB’ squad rather than the ‘Sky’ squad (ignoring the fact that they are, for the most part, identical). Saxo may have him on some sort of pre-contract agreement but if he’s looking to break that there’s no reason they publicise the signing. Sky may well be waiting to cash in on Cav before paying off Saxo so it could end up being domino’s.

stumps wrote:Please correct

stumps wrote:

Please correct me if i’m wrong – and i hope iam – but isnt JTL going to Saxo ?

That was my understanding but nothing’s official and ever since the ToB/Worlds every man and his cycling correspondent has been talking up JTL to Sky (probably just because it’s a nice easy leap for them to make). I think given the choice that’s where he’d go but he may already have signed something with Saxo, not that contracts are worth much when Sky get involved…

I reckon he will end up at Sky in the end but that might not be for a while yet.

There’s a point re Boonen and
There’s a point re Boonen and Chavanel et al.

What races is Cav going to be targetting? Just Grand Tours? I read when he joined Sky that he wanted to move towards Classics as he got older and the younger quicker guys came through, OPQS doesn’t fit the bill for that as he’ll be competing for classic spots with Boonen etc. Think he may get pigeon-holed as purely a grand tour sprinter if he moves to OPQS. That might be what he wants now but with more guys like Sagan/Degenkolb/Kittel/Bouhanni coming through how long can he keep winning in those types of finishes?

As a fan of Spesh and Cav I
As a fan of Spesh and Cav I hope this does happen tbh.

I looked extensively at both Pina and Spesh when I bought mine and couldn’t agree that Pina are much nicer bikes tbh.

I doubt it Stumps, I think
I doubt it Stumps, I think Sky have probably made all of their big signings for next year, and probably reallocated the Cav budget to sign people like Cataldo.

I could be wrong though but it does seem a little late and no-one fitting that bill seems to be visibly ‘available’. A couple of good classics specialists would really add to the team but with the emergence of Uran, EBH (as a classics rider), Henao and a couple of others they could really mount a challenge on all fronts with the riders they have. I think part of their poor classics forms this year was actually as a result of Cav being on board and him being their number 1 rider for races that don’t really suit him but he could have won under the right circumstances (M-SR for example). Hopefully next year Sky will go into those races with more ‘options’ having learned from the Olympics and pick a squad that can win in a number of ways. Swift may fit this bill better as he’s a sprinter that can handle more hills than Cav and be there to compete without being molly-coddled and having a full team around him.

It’s a shame that Sky lost Nordhaug though, he looks like he has the potential to be a great one day racer.

Spesh may pay to get him out
Spesh may pay to get him out of his contract but I assume that would come as part of a large personal sponsorship/image rights deal as bashthebox has said. It’ll also tie them into supplying OPQS for a few more years, possibly for the length of whatever contract he signs and ensure that Cav does a large amount of promotional work/appearances at Spesh events.

I wonder if the mid-season rumours of Sky ditching Pinarello only to re-sign with them came at the start of the horse-trading re Cav. Once Sky knew that he wanted out perhaps they gave up on a Spesh deal and stuck to Pinarello who likely would pay them more for the privalege of supplying their bikes.

Cav was really vocal on his
Cav was really vocal on his love for Specialized when he was at HTC, right? I reckon a glowing endorsement from Cav is worth an awful lot to a bike company. Plus there’s probably something tied in to image rights now for X number of years.