Cavendish Draws First Blood in Sports Personality Stakes
Mark Cavendish has become the first British sportsman to stake a serious claim on the BBC’s annual Sports Personality of the Year award. A week after announcing 2023 would be his last year as a professional cyclist, the 38-year-old took the final stage of the Giro d’Italia on Sunday.
The victory was his 17th stage success in the Italian Grand Tour. It was the scene of his very first Grand Tour stage win 15 years beforehand. The triumph also completed a sequence of winning a stage of the Giro d’Italia in each and every year he has contested the race – seven times in total.
Despite some painful bumps in the road, Mark Cavendish is on the verge of becoming the winning most Tour de France stage winner of all time. ©GettyImages
Cavendish now boasts 162 professional victories. His achievements have seen him awarded an MBE for services to British cycling. And after he became Britain’s first winner of the points classification in the Tour de France, he collected the Sports Personality of the Year title in 2011.
Stokes Success Hinges on His Team
It is the 2019 Sports Personality of the Year (SPOTY) winner, Ben Stokes, that the bookmakers currently favour. A repeat of his heroics in the ICC Men’s Cricket World Cup – scheduled for October and November – would make him hard to beat.
But England is 7/2 to win the competition, and Stokes’ chances of a second SPOTY award hinge on the country successfully defending its title. As the best online betting sites quote Stokes at just 5/1 in the SPOTY 2023 market, he makes little appeal despite finishing runner-up in last year’s SPOTY.
A Frankie Derby Could Seal the Deal
Frankie Dettori is 6/1 to win Saturday’s Derby aboard Arrest. The best-known jockey since Lester Piggott is also retiring at the end of 2023 and, should he land the Epsom classic, Boylesports industry best SPOTY odds of 9/1 will become a distant memory.
Unlike Stokes, Dettori’s SPOTY chances do not depend on one event. A hatful of winners at Royal Ascot or a seventh Arc de Triomphe victory could suffice. The 52-year-old rider was nominated for SPOTY in 1996 – due to his astonishing achievement of riding all seven winners on an Ascot card – when he finished third.
Frankie Dettori could vault to Sports Personality favouritism if Arrest (pictured winning at Chester) can land the Derby for him on Saturday. ©GettyImages
His success in the 2023 2000 Guineas may already be enough to earn Dettori a SPOTY nomination. This fact alone makes him a more attractive betting proposition than Stokes.
Identifying the Key Cog in a Potential Winning Team
Another three cricketers follow in the SPOTY betting: Joe Root, James Anderson and Harry Brook. The trio can be backed on 16/1, 20/1 and 25/1 respectively with the UK’s novelty betting sites. Their presence – along with the bigger-priced Rehan Ahmed and Jos Butler – serves to dilute Stokes’ prospects and, like him, their chances probably depend on World Cup success.
Similarly, bookmakers have several members of England’s FIFA Women’s World Cup squad listed in the SPOTY betting – including Fran Kirby, Millie Bright and Alessia Russo. Like the cricketers, they need to be part of the World Cup winning side, and England is 7/2 to succeed at the tournament in Australia and New Zealand this summer.
Hamilton Is Down and Joshua Is Out
Thereafter, the betting features a mishmash of familiar names that have little apparent chance. Lewis Hamilton – twice a SPOTY winner – needs to win Formula 1s World Drivers’ Championship to have a chance in 2023. It is a 50/1 shot.
Boxers, despite outstanding success in recent years, have never made an impression with the show’s televoters when shortlisted. Tyson Fury has twice been nominated but finished outside the top three on both occasions.
At the betting exchanges, Antony Joshua was 1.13 to win and 1.01 to place in the 2017 SPOTY final. In a huge upset, he finished fourth. Six years later, he is quoted on 40/1 by Coral to go three places better. No thanks!
Record Popularity and Support for Cycling
With many imponderables at work, Mark Cavendish must represent value in this year’s SPOTY race at Unibet’s 25/1 odds. His sport is set to receive a huge boost in understanding and popularity when Netflix releases its new Tour de France documentary series, ‘Unchained’, on June 8th.
It will put the retiring rider under the spotlight like never before. It is not like ‘Cav’ is a little-known star or struggling for popularity. When Cavendish took the 2011 SPOTY title, he polled almost half of the votes. Among a ten-runner field that included subsequent winners, Andy Murray and Mo Farrah, it was a veritable landslide.
The cherry on the Knickerbocker is Cavendish’s prospects of breaking Eddy Merckx’s record of 34 Tour de France stage victories in 2023. He currently shares the distinction with the long-retired legendary Belgian rider.
More Reasons for the Missile to Soar
And then there is the back story of his diagnosis and battle with depression during a loss of form in 2018. Cavendish, nicknamed the ‘Manx Missile’, has also suffered from illness – particularly Pfeiffer’s disease – and injury.
Eighteen months ago, Cavendish endured a collapsed lung and two broken ribs in a crash during the Ghent Six Day track event. His 2018 crash in the one-day Milan-San Remo race was horrific to watch. It would have kept mere mortals away from a bicycle forever. His accident on the opening day of the 2014 Tour de France was another horror show that led to intrusive surgery
The final reason for optimism is the record of cyclists in SPOTY. Chris Hoy (2008), Mark Cavendish (2011), Bradley Wiggins (2012) and Geraint Thomas (2018) have given cycling five SPOTY champions in the past 15 years. It is an unmatched success rate.
