Tour de France 2025 route could tempt Mark Cavendish to 'go one more time' – Jens Voigt

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Jens Voigt has said that the recently-announced 2025 Tour de France route could benefit Mark Cavendish, should the Manx Missile choose to postpone retirement again and shoot for a 36th win on the French roads. Voigt believes that a hillier beginning to the race could "invite" Cavendish to "go one more time" at the Tour. Can Cavendish avoid the lure of a potential 36th stage win?

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The 2025 Tour de France route could tempt Mark Cavendish to U-turn on retirement and "go one more time" at the world's biggest cycling race, according to Eurosport expert Jens Voigt.

Next year's Tour will be the first to be staged exclusively on French soil since 2020, and will see the finish return to the Champs-Elysees on the 50th anniversary of the first finish there.

The route sprawls 3,320km, with two time trial stages and six mountain-top finishes, with race director Christian Prudhomme saying the organisers have "cut the sprint stages and laid traps everywhere".

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Despite that, Voigt - who won two Tour stages in 2001 and 2006 - believes that Cavendish could be tempted by a kinder start to the race and look to extend his record of 35 stage wins.

"The 2025 Tour is pretty standard in terms of overall lengths and the amount of flat and hilly stages and mountain-top finishes," the German said.

"One change is that we have nine more or less flat stages until the first really tough stage (Stage 10) in the Massif Central.

"That does invite Cav to go one more time, to try to win more stages and to try to hold off the chasing stage hunter Pogacar!"

Cavendish moved clear of Eddy Merckx with his 35th stage victory at the Tour in 2024, although his record may soon come under threat from three-time champion Tadej Pogacar, who has won 17 times in just five editions.

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Two-time winner Alberto Contador praised the route, noting the return of an uphill time trial that he believes will be "great for the viewers".

Contador was referencing Stage 13's 11km run from Loudenvielle to Peyragudes, with gradients that top out at 16%.

"It’s a route that I would have liked as a rider," Contador said.

"A flat time trial, which isn’t too long, 33km. And then a mountain time trial. I miss seeing these uphill time trials - I think they are great for the viewers.

"They allow you to take on really hard climbs, but not one after another. They are also great to watch in person along the route."

The Spaniard also believes that teams could opt to build their race around a sprinter, despite Prudhomme’s insistence that the sprint stages had been struck through.

"Another thing teams that are going for the GC battle will have to take into account is whether they take a sprinter," he said.

"There are a lot of opportunities for sprinters and so refusing to take a quick rider to focus on the GC might not be a great choice unless you are going with a big favourite."

He added: "The Courchevel La Plagne day (Stage 19) is brutal. 5500 metres of elevation gain on the last week of the Tour. This stage could really do some damage.

"Not to forget the epic Mont Ventoux - a classic French climb on a Tour that has all France parcours. It’s a route that I would have liked if I was still riding."

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