Tour of Britain: Boom in gold after Cavendish win
- Published
Cavendish won the stage while Boom triumphed overall
Mark Cavendish sprinted to his second stage victory in the Tour of Britain in rain-hit London while Dutchman Lars Boom won the event overall.
Cavendish and HTC-Highroad team-mate Mark Renshaw secured their third one-two finish of the week on Whitehall.
Rabobank rider Boom won the final gold jersey by 36 seconds having won two stages and finished second in two more.
Team Sky's Steve Cummings was second after riding well in Sunday morning's time trial, won by Brit Alex Dowsett.
And another Sky man, Geraint Thomas, won the points jersey, some consolation after a midweek crash that saw him drop out of overall contention.
Cummings was pleased with overall position, saying: "It's a good result. Obviously, with it being our home race, it would be good if we could have won.
"We didn't really have a lot of good luck throughout the race. I crashed, Geraint crashed and then we came up against a really strong rider in Lars Boom on that terrain. But overall it's pretty good."
The final stage was a 10-lap circuit of central London on Sunday afternoon.
"Rabobank was doing a lot of the work at the front and Team Sky was also controlling," said HTC-Highroad sporting director Allan Peiper.
"But by the last kilometre, Renshaw and Eisel were on top of it, and dropped Cav off in the usual fashion for the last time."
"The crowds were great; it was a spectacular finish for Cav in his home country, as well as for the team to finish a long tour on a high note."
Dowsett, won stage 8a by five seconds from Boom and said: "It's amazing; it's one of those things I would hopefully tell my children in years to come."
"We can leave this stage with our heads held high because we've thrown everything at Lars Boom. We've got a strong team here but hats off to the guy."
Cavendish will start as favourite in next Sunday's road race at the World Championships in Denmark, external. The event begins on Tuesday with the women's time trial, with the men's time trial on Wednesday.
Stage 8b results:
1 Mark Cavendish (HTC/GB) 1 hour 59 min 13 sec
2 Mark Renshaw(HTC/Aus) same time
3 Robert Förster (UnH/Ger)same time
4 Geraint Thomas (Sky/GB) same time
5 Ben Swift (Sky/GB) same time
Stage 8a (time trial) results:
1 Alex Dowsett(Sky/GB) 10 min 14 sec
2 Lars Boom(Rab/Ned) + 5 sec
3 Lieuwe Westra(Vac/Ned) same time
4 Stephen Cummings (Sky/GB) + 9 sec
5 Geraint Thomas (Sky/GB) + 16sec
Final overall standings
1 Boom2 hours 57 min 35 sec
2 Cummings + 36 sec
3 Jan Barta (TNA/Cze) +55
4 Linus Gerdemann (Leo/Ger) +57
5 Jonathan Tiernan Locke (Rap/GB) + 1 min 3 sec