Mark Cavendish broke the all-time Tour de France record for most stage wins, taking his 35th stage victory at Saint Vurba on Wednesday.

However, looking back at the first stage of this year's Tour de France, it was not so clear-cut.

"Project 35 is still alive." He had just had a torturous day in the heat. However, on the first climb of the day, he fell off the bike and vomited as a result of ingesting large amounts of water to rehydrate himself.

At the front of the race, despite the French fairy tale of Romain Bardet winning the yellow jersey in the farewell Tour with his DSM teammate Frank van den Broeck, all eyes were on Cavendish's battle at the back of the

At this point in the race, the race was in the balance.

Up until this point, I had never heard the term "Project 35," but true to the Baader-Meinhof phenomenon, I have seen and heard it everywhere since. Whether Cavendish himself uses the term is unclear, but it is clear that he did not leave no stone unturned in his quest for his next victory.

His bike, a Willières Philante SLR aero bike in brilliant custom colors, was fitted with the aerodynamic bottle of a time trial bike, and on stage 3 (the first chance that was eventually interrupted by a crash) his Nike shoes were Boa wrapped in a fabric sleeve to smooth airflow over the dial, but that was only the beginning.

The Manxman is no stranger to technology hacks in his pursuit of victory; when he won the World Road Championships in 2011, he employed an add-on shell on the top of his Specialized helmet to plug the vents and improve aerodynamics. The UCI subsequently banned the addition of removable covers in races, and Intermarché Wanty is still grappling with this issue in this year's race.

But now that the record has been broken, here are some of the clever tricks, hacks, and optimizations used by the British rider and his Astana-Kazakstan team.

Now let's see what he changed.

Let's start with the bottle, which was evident in stage 3. Bikes these days pay a great deal of attention to the molding of carbon tubes to improve their slight aero performance. Over the years, brands have worked to optimize their bottles. Campagnolo did it a few years ago, and it is a common sight on modern time trial bikes.

Tacx's simply titled Aero Bottle and Cage is used here. Narrower in width and slightly deeper in depth than traditional round bottles, they are better suited to fill the space inside the frame triangle. It is unclear how much faster the AeroBottle will be, but both aero specialists Aerocoach and Swiss Side agree that the AeroBottle is faster.

Another noteworthy aspect of stage 3 was that Cavendish changed his front and rear wheels at the same time with 88km to go.

It is not clear why he replaced them. He did not have a double puncture, and the new wheel was apparently the same depth as the one he removed.

Vittoria offers several variations of the Corsa Pro used by Cavendish's Astana-Kazakstan team. The standard Corsa Pro is the everyday race tire, while the Corsa Pro Speed is a lighter, slightly faster tire for time trials and sprints. The standard Pro, which is more puncture resistant, may have been used in the early stages of the race, and switched to the Pro Speed to increase speed in the race.

On stage 3, a small fabric sleeve encased Cavendish's white Nike shoes and those of the entire team.

The sleeves, which work similarly to aero overshoes, smooth the flow of air through the nonaero Boa dials. It is a product of the British brand NoPinz and is called the "HyperSonic Tober Shoe."

Not a common product, but we have seen it before: the Sub-6 road shoe from Specialized, released in 2015, was a lace-up shoe that did two things: it kept shoelaces tidy and smoothed airflow, but came with a "warp sleeve."

Given the high temperatures seen at the Tour so far, it is not surprising that he did not opt for a full aero overshoe, given that temperature regulation is also an important factor in performance.

Next up are the socks, and for something so seemingly trivial, Cavendish has made a big deal out of them.

These socks, with a V-shaped aerochevron on the front, were also from NoPinz and turned out to be "P35 socks." They are completely custom-made and, according to the website, priced at just one pence short of £1,000. This is not the first time we have seen socks priced this high, but when we contacted NoPinz, they said this was correct.

NoPinz's website states that they are "designed by champions for champions," adding that they were made for a "groundbreaking project." What that project is, and what the P35 stands for, is anyone's guess.

It is worth noting, however, that in Stage 5 he traded it for another pair.

Speaking of expensive shoes, one of Cavendish's lead out men, Cece Boll, wears custom-made aero shoes. They are from a brand called Anti-Roper, and since they are very niche, the price is only known at the time of application.

The retention dials are hidden from the airflow in the heel and appear to be made almost entirely of carbon fiber. This is not the first time Boll has used these shoes. He wore them at last year's Tour.

Returning to Cavendish, the next aero optimization is due to his skinsuit.

On stage 3, he wore a skinsuit with aerodynamic trip lines on the sleeves. As can be seen from the photo above, not all of his teammates wore the same skinsuit, but most of them did. The trip strips on the sleeves are said to be aerodynamic, but the exact difference is unknown.

In stage 5, Cavendish wore a different skinsuit with smoother sleeves and what appeared to be an aerobic base layer underneath. The reason for this change is unclear, but may simply be for comfort or related to the heat.

Also, shoe covers were removed during stage 5 of the race.

The last hack we found was Cavendish's radio position. Most riders put it in a pocket sewn into the inside back of their jerseys, but the blocky protrusion on the back is a rather aerodynamically unfavorable shape.

Instead, Cavendish wears them on his chest, something that time triallists have started doing in recent years for aerodynamic effect, and one can assume that the British have the same motivation.