Eddy Merckx wants to see his record broken: "I hope Cavendish will return"

Mark Cavendish's quest to claim the outright record for most Tour de France stage wins was sadly brought to a premature end on stage 8 as he suffered a broken collarbone. Despite Cavendish being set to retire at the end of the year, Eddy Merckx, the man who he shares the record with, hopes he will be persuaded to return.

"I hope Cavendish will return," says 'the Cannibal' to Sporza, on his fellow 34-time Tour de France stage winner. “It would be a shame if he had to end his career with a broken collarbone. I hope he will ride at least until the Tour next year.”

On the 2023 Tour de France, Merckx was full of praise for the winner in waiting, Jonas Vingegaard. The Jumbo-Visma leader has blown Tadej Pogacar away in the third week and looks set to win the race by a huge margin.

“It was exciting up until the time trial, but when Vingegaard pulled away from Pogačar in the Pyrenees, we could already see that he was a slightly better climber when it was really steep in the high mountains,” Merckx recalls. “In the time trial and the day after on the Col de la Loze, he was the better climber.”

“It has been a very tough Tour and they keep riding fast. The diets are better. It's all much more professional than in our time," concludes the 78-year-old, five-time Tour de France winner. "The material is also different. I weighed my bike from 1971 last week and it was more than 10 kg. That is also a big difference."