Purple Bar Tape has been traveling hither, thither and yon these last weeks, and was thus sadly deficient in the duty of bringing you the (un)witty commentary to which you’ve become so accustomed.

But it’s 1:30 in the a.m., and what can we say, we’re back.

Before we begin, this is awesome. And now, back to our regularly-scheduled programming.

It seems someone around here promised you some old-fashioned Tour wrap-up blabber-chatter.

But where to begin? Surely, we can’t wrap all of this up in one or two or even three posts.

And so, it is for that reason that, well, we’re going to be working through five installments — short installments, but installments nonetheless (and thus, a record for single word usage was set) — on the 2009 Tour and its eventual successor next year.

Tonight, we begin not with Lance (*gasp*), but instead with someone way faster. That’s right, the Manx Missile, the British Bomber, Mr. Spitfire himself, Mark “on my mobile” Cavendish.

Hushovd took the green jersey, and serious props to the Norwegian for pretty much bumming a leadout off Columbia like, all the time, but I think we can all agree that Cavendish was both far and away the field’s best sprinter.

There’s not much description for it, really. I mean, back in the day (three years ago), sprint finishes in the big UCI stage races were a veritable Baskin Robbins of sprinting variety.

Boonen was huge and powerful. Hushovd had the guile. Robbie McEwen liked to headbutt people, and damned if it didn’t work.

But Cavendish doesn’t really have a style — he just rides away. He’s simply hands down the fastest person in the world on a bicycle right now, no one can touch him. He is the Usain Bolt of cycling, and like the rangy Jamaican, every sprint finish is just his play toy.

Sometimes he breaks it, because he’s young and petulant and raw. But most of the time, he’s just so ridiculously, blindingly, mind-bogglingly fast, that it wouldn’t matter.

But the thing about Cavendish is that, to those of us in the English-speaking world anyway, he’s a symbol.

Seriously. I know it sounds kind of dumb or cheesy to the average American, whose preferred sports are relatively homogenous (with the slight exception, perhaps, of baseball).

But other than Lance Armstrong and some of his former Postal/Discovery boys, this generation of bicycling America doesn’t really identify culturally with most of the riders in the field. It’s nothing prejudiced or personal, just different people in different places, that sort of thing.

Now, though, with Cavendish and Bradley Wiggins exploding cycling’s popularity in Britain and Armstrong coming back looking less like a robot and more like America’s favorite everyman, there’s something to really get behind.

There are even two American-sponsored teams in the Tour — Garmin and Columbia — and both were prominent players in various facets of this year’s Tour. And they will be joined by Team Radio Shack (RadioShack? Radioshack? I dunno) next year.

Even Christian Prudhomme, long an Armstrong antagonist, gave the Texan credit for bringing some thrill back into this year’s race (foreshadowing ahead: possible future post idea?), and in turn also complimented the entire contingent of predicate-loving riders.

“After lagging behind in cycling compared to their success in other sports, the English speakers are starting to make a real name for themselves in cycling,” Prudhomme said. Heady stuff from that mouth.

Take from this what you will. Perhaps it doesn’t register to you, or it doesn’t matter. Honestly, until I read Prudhomme’s comments yesterday, it never really registered with me.

But I think there is at least some truth to it, and if nothing else, I’ve never been so excited for the next Tour de France as I am for the 2010 edition. Bring it on.