Given the GC guys who got hurt (Uran broken collar bone, Barguil fractured vertebrae, Gorka Izaguire crashed out) and who got dropped in the Crosswinds (Yates, Chaves, Soler, Superman Lopez), Cavendish abandoning isn't a long way down the news about Paris Nice.
When he's been healthy, he's been in the top ranks of the sprinters. Clearly he's not been healthy for a couple of years, and what Friebe doesn't say in the interview is that people get old. You can understand Cavendish thinking that he can beat any of the current crop of sprinters because he's done it before, but fundamentally, at some point, even if he were healthy and firing, age will catch up and he'll struggle to win races. With the health issues he's had (and crashes), whether he can ever get to that condition again (before age dulls his edge) remains to be seen. Of Hot Flatus' list, there are only a couple who would get anywhere near Cav at his best (maybe Groenewegen, Gaviria and Kittel?), but sprinting has such fine margins that even a couple of tenths of a percent down makes a huge difference...
