LIMOGES, France, July 6 — German sports star Marcel Kittel has become one of cycling's fastest sprinters, and on Tuesday he won stage four of the Tour de France here in Limoges at the end of the race's longest stage, which featured a grueling finish.
Here's a closer look at Kittel, who studied computer science before landing a contract to race bikes professionally:
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Sprint ace
Kittel is one of pro cycling's best sprinters, but he is beatable. This year's Tour de France has seen Mark Cavendish return to his winning ways — he won stages one and three, at Mont Saint-Michel and Angers. Yet Kittel took a much-needed win on stage four at Limoges.
Kittel's ideal sprint is a flat drag race where pure sprinters like him can open up and sprint all-out for 200 to 300 meters at nearly 50 mph.
"The biggest difference between me and the others is that I can maintain a very high speed for very a long period of time," Kittel once told Cyclingnews. "The key to winning is knowing, depending on the type of course, how long you will have to hold that high speed in a sprint."
Kittel won stage four of the Tour de France on Tuesday
After missing out on at least two sprint stage wins earlier this Tour, Kittel, in blue, snagged stage four in a photo finish from France's Bryan Coquard, in black and yellow.
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New kid on the block
Kittel turned pro in 2011 and won nearly 20 races in his debut season. In 2012 he kept winning, and in 2013 he won bigger races, including a whopping four stages of the Tour de France.
Then in 2014, in his second Tour, he upset the favorites again to win four more stages. He was now without question cycling's fastest sprinter.
But his 2015 season was a setback, as the big German suffered from a persistent virus infection. His team that year decided not to bring him to the Tour, and not without controversy. The next season Kittel landed on a different team.
"Health is everything — also your key to success," he later said.
He bounced back in 2016 and has racked up several victories, including two dominant stage victories in May's Giro d'Italia, where he also wore the leader's jersey. And now he can add stage four of the 2016 Tour to his résumé.
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