Nicolas Roche passed up the chance to compete in what can be considered a ‘home’ race this weekend, ending his season in advance of the Tour of Lombardy. The cosmopolitan rider, who was born in France, grew up in Ireland, then moved back to France prior to settling in Italy, resides in Varese, close to the race route.
Roche has missed out on the opportunity to compete in the Italian end of season Classics, but feels sure he has made the right choice.
“I haven’t touched the bike since Australia last week. It was time to take a break…I even think that the worlds was already a race too much,” he told VeloNation yesterday evening. “I was feeling knackered there. Well, I was feeling good, then bang! I’d nothing left. I just didn’t have it any more.”
Roche has had a superb season, taking on the mantle of leader with the Ag2r La Mondiale team and fully justifying that status. He began racing at the start of February, showing good form by the end of that month when he placed third in the 1.1 GP dell’Insubria. He kept the momentum going after that, netting tenth in Paris-Nice, fifth in the Volta a Catalunya and several top ten stage placings in each.
A solid performance in spring Classics was followed by a worrying period when he pulled a muscle in the Tour of Romandie and was forced to take several weeks off the bike. The enforced break worked to his favour, though, effectively recharging his batteries prior to netting second in the Irish championships, fifteenth in the Tour de France, eighth in the Clasica San Sebastian and a superb seventh overall in the Vuelta a España.
It was the first time he had ridden two Grand Tours in the same season, and the fact that he rode strongly in the second of the two shows that he is continuing to gain pace as a rider, and contender.
He’s definitely earned some time off, even if he’s got one more competitive appointment this season. “The plan is that I will rest for at least another ten days without the bike…although that’s not strictly true,” he adds. “I have my own race on Sunday back in Nice. It is my second edition of the Nicolas Roche time trial, at San Raphael. I will be riding that with my brother Alexis. He started with the club in Antibes one month ago. It’s good, because my dad [former Tour winner Stephen Roche] is doing it with Florian, my younger brother.
“It is like a team time trial, but with two riders, the second rider counting for the result. Normally there is a young rider and an older one who has to be over 50, or something like that. But because it is my race, I will do it with my brother [laughs]. I organise my own rules!”
The aim is clearly to have a bit of fun, and to allow Roche’s fans to spend some time with him. That number is sure to have grown this year and, if he has the season he intends in 2011, will be even bigger by the time the third running of the race takes place next autumn.