Cavendish wears red in Vuelta a Espana

Mark Cavendish took possession of the leader’s red jersey after helping his HTC-Columbia team storm to victory in the team time-trial on the opening day of the Vuelta a Espana on Saturday.

HTC-Columbia finished the 13-kilometre night race in Seville in a time of 14 minutes and six seconds, finishing 10 seconds ahead of second-placed Liquigas-Doimo and 12 clear of Saxo Bank in third.

HTC-Columbia’s success means their riders hold the top eight positions in the standings, with Briton Cavendish crossing the line first to take the overall lead in his first-ever Vuelta.

Ireland has two riders in this year's Vuelta, Philip Deignan and Nicolas Roche. Roche lies 114th after the team time-trial, 33 seconds behind Cavendish. Deignan lies 185th, one minute 53 seconds off the lead.

Briton Cavendish said on his team’s website, www.highroadsports.com: ‘As soon as we did the first training ride on the course on Thursday even after 10 minutes on the bike we were riding so well together I had the feeling we were going to win.

‘The team time trial is my favourite discipline because the whole team gets rewarded, it's special that way, and at the same time you need to get it 100% right for it to work.’

‘I get to stand on the podium quite a lot, but that's because of eight other guys hard work. Today we all got to stand on the podium and I'm incredibly proud of what my team-mates did.’

Regarding the leader`s jersey he earned for finishing first, Cavendish added: ‘It belongs to the whole squad. I'm wearing it on behalf of the team.’

The 25-year-old Cavendish, a winner of five Tour de France stages in July and a total of 15 in three seasons, can now boast stage wins in all three grand tours having also tasted success in the Giro d'Italia and Tour.

The second stage of the Vuelta sees the riders race 173.7 kilometres from Alcala de Guadaira to Marbella on Sunday.

Leading positions after stage 1 (Sevilla, 13km): 1 Mark Cavendish (Gbr) Team HTC-Columbia 14mins 06secs, 2 Peter Velits (Svk) Team HTC-Columbia at same time, 3 Martin Velits (Svk) Team HTC-Columbia at same time, 4 Lars-Ytting Bak (Den) Team HTC-Columbia at same time, 5 Hayden Roulston (Nzl) Team HTC-Columbia at same time, 6 Kanstantin Sivtsov (Blr) Team HTC-Columbia at same time, 7 Tejay Van Garderen (USA) Team HTC-Columbia at same time, 7 Matthew Goss (Gbr) Team HTC-Columbia at same time, 8 Daniele Bennati (Ita) Liquigas-Doimo at 0.10, 9 Frederik Willems (Bel) Liquigas-Doimo at same time, 10 Jacopo Guarnieri (Ita) Liquigas-Doimo at same time, 11 Ivan Santaromita (Ita) Liquigas-Doimo at same time, 12 Roman Kreuziger (Cze) Liquigas-Doimo at same time, 13 Vincenzo Nibali (Ita) Liquigas-Doimo at same time, 14 Maciej Paterski (Pol) Liquigas-Doimo at same time, 15 Stuart O'Grady (Aus) Team Saxo Bank at 0.12

General classification after stage 1: 1 Mark Cavendish (Gbr) Team HTC-Columbia 14mins 06secs, 2 Peter Velits (Svk) Team HTC-Columbia at same time, 3 Martin Velits (Svk) Team HTC-Columbia at same time, 4 Lars-Ytting Bak (Den) Team HTC-Columbia at same time, 5 Hayden Roulston (Nzl) Team HTC-Columbia at same time, 6 Kanstantin Sivtsov (Blr) Team HTC-Columbia at same time, 7 Tejay Van Garderen (USA) Team HTC-Columbia at same time, 8 Matthew Goss (Gbr) Team HTC-Columbia at same time, 9 Daniele Bennati (Ita) Liquigas-Doimo at 0.10, 10 Frederik Willems (Bel) Liquigas-Doimo at same time, 11 Jacopo Guarnieri (Ita) Liquigas-Doimo at same time, 12 Ivan Santaromita (Ita) Liquigas-Doimo at same time, 13 Roman Kreuziger (Cze) Liquigas-Doimo at same time, 14 Vincenzo Nibali (Ita) Liquigas-Doimo at same time, 15 Maciej Paterski (Pol) Liquigas-Doimo at same time

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