Bike racer Mark Cavendish, the Manx Missile

Right now, the Tour de France bicycle race is taking place. It is considered one of the most grueling of all sports events; essentially the equivalent of running several marathon races a day, every day, for 21 days straight. The terrain and conditions include mountains, cobblestones, headwinds, rain, and oppressive summer heat. Such a sport is, naturally, a young man’s game. Age 39 in the Tour is considered ancient.

Yet, one of the biggest stories of this year’s Tour de France is the return, out of retirement, of 39 year-old racer Mark Cavendish. A sprinter from the Isle of Man, known as the Manx Missile, Cavendish was tied for the record for most Tour de France stage wins (34), and desperately wanted to break that record. Last year, Cavendish entered the Tour with the hope of breaking the record, and announced that he would retire afterward. Unfortunately, he crashed and broke his collar bone during the early stages, without the win. Cavendish has had many bad days as a bike racer, including a number of serious crashes and injuries, but he has always gotten back up on his bike. He ended his retirement to come back this year, and, with strong team supporting him, he won the stage yesterday and broke the all-time record.

If the parallels to President Joe Biden are not apparent, let’s name them:

The Liberty Bell may toll for Joe Biden in 2024

On Tuesday, Pennsylvania held its 2024 Democratic and Republican presidential primaries. While President Joe Biden and Donald Trump each won their respective party’s primary as expected, more warning signs popped up for Trump. Specifically, while President Biden won the Democratic primary with over 88 percent of the vote and over 926,000 votes cast, Trump had just over 83 percent of the vote and only 789,000 total votes.

This Trump deficit is significant because Pennsylvania is one of a small number of “battleground” states that will likely determine the 2024 presidential election. As the Pennsylvania publication York Daily Record explains:

Pennsylvania has a long history of being consequential in presidential elections — choosing 20 of the last 25 presidents.

With 20 electoral votes up for grabs, it is considered by some analysts as the most important state in the 2020 presidential election.

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‘Campaigns know if their messaging works here, it can probably work nationally,’ said Jesse White, a political strategist at Perpetual Fortitude, a Democratic consulting and digital management firm. ‘To be able to come in here as a national campaign and have the resources and messaging to effectively win a state as diverse as Pennsylvania is real work.’