Evans becomes first Australian to win the Tour de France

Cadel Evans became the first Australian to win the Tour de France after staying safe in the peloton in Sundays (July 24) final stage won by Briton Mark Cavendish on the Champs Elysees for the third year in a row.The 34-year-old Evans, the oldest Tour winner since World War II, showed resilience throughout as he broke three-time champion Alberto Contadors unbeaten run in a grand tour since 2007.Luxembourgs Andy Schleck was second overall for the third year in succession, 1:34 behind Evans, who claimed his maiden grand tour title.Frank Schleck was third, 2:30 off the pace as the two brothers climbed onto the final Tour de France podium for the first time.Evanss victory also broke Spanish domination of the race after Alberto Contador (2007, 09, 10), Oscar Pereiro (2006) and Carlos Sastre (2008) had claimed five titles in a row.Few people believed in me, I always believed in me and those few people, my team and a few people around me and myself were in the end what mattered most and here we are today. And yeah, we did it, Evans said.The Australian only took the overall leaders yellow jersey after Saturdays final time trial in which he humbled Andy Schleck by 2:31, easily overcoming a 57-second deficit.Cavendish was also made to wait to finally claim the green jersey for the points classification after starting the day with a 15-point advantage over Spains Jose Roaquin Rojas.He won the bunch sprint at the end of the 95-km ride from Creteil after once again benefiting from his HTC-Highroad teams lead-out train.The Briton beat Norways Edvald Boasson Hagen and German Andre Greipel, who were second and third respectively. Team Garmin-Cervelo, who won the team time trial and stages through American Tyler Farrar and Norwegian Thor Hushov, won the team standings.Frenchman Pierre Rolland, who won the prestigious stage to lAlpe dHuez, claimed the white jersey for the best under-25 rider while Spaniard Samuel Sanchez won the polka-dot jersey for the best climber.