Record-chasing Mark Cavendish and Germany’s Marcel Kittel are out of the Tour de France.
Cavendish and Kittel, two of cycling’s top sprinters, were on Wednesday disqualified from the Tour de France after proving too slow on its grueling 11th stage in the Alps.
The pair have a combined 44 career wins at the Tour de France, but both finished well beyond the allowed time limit on the 108.5km leg from Albertville to La Rosiere near the Italian border.
Cavendish struggled across the finish line atop the summit more than 1 hour, 5 minutes after stage winner Geraint Thomas. That was more than double the 31 minutes allowed.
Cavendish entered the race hoping to add to his 30 Tour de France stage wins and close in on Eddy Merckx’s record of 34.
Kittel, 30, of Team Katusha-Alpecin also missed the cut after finishing 44 minutes behind Thomas. He has won 14 Tour de France stages, including five last year.
Cavendish’s Team Dimension Data teammate Mark Renshaw also finished too late.
Cavendish, 33, who is from the Isle of Man, won four stages in 2016, but he had to pull out of last year’s event on the fourth stage when he broke his shoulder in a crash following a clash with Peter Sagan, who was then expelled for causing the injury.
Cavendish had not seriously contested any of the six sprint finishes already featured this year. With the race now in the southern mountains, there are only two flat stages left before the traditional finish in Paris.
Kittel’s teammate Rick Zabel is to be allowed to continue after race organizers showed clemency, as he only missed the cut by three seconds, Katusha-Alpecin said.
The time cut for a stage is calculated based on a percentage of the stage winner’s time, as well as the length and difficulty of the leg.
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