Three-time Grand Tour winner planning his season around hopefully forthcoming invitations
Geox-TMC was passed over for a Wild Card at this year's Tour de France, but the team isn't panicking just yet. There are still two other Grand Tours on offer, and they have a former winner of both of them, who has now made it clear that he'll target both of them in 2011…so long as the team gets the necessary invitations to take part in the Giro d'Italia and the Vuelta a Espana.
Denis Menchov can lay claim to two Vueltas a Espana and one Giro d'Italia. His Giro victory was in the Giro's 100th anniversary and came in spectacular fashion over Danilo Di Luca, who tested positive for CERA-EPO during that extremely eventful 2009 Giro.
If there's one place that Geox-TMC seems to have an in - it's at the Giro. With this in mind, the team has endured a series of unpleasant notices from RCS in recent days - they were not invited to the Monte Paschi-Strade Bianche, nor were they invited to Tirreno-Adriatico, but, the team did score an invitation to Milano-Sanremo. Had Mauro Gianetti's team not received an invitation to La Primavera, one could expect that there would be no good news to come from RCS in terms of the Giro. The invite to the year's first monument will certainly give the team hope of good news in the months to come, and if they do receive that much hoped for invitation, they'll be able to count on the 2009 winner to seek to replicate his performance of two years ago.
"I will go to the Giro to win. I really want the Giro, and afterwards, I will try to win the Vuelta," said the quiet Russian in an interview with Marca.
With the team only able to race a maximum of two Grand Tours, the paths of the squad's two stars, Menchov and Carlos Sastre, will definitively cross in both Grand Tours. Menchov is not worried about the dueling interests, who have the Grand Tour triple crown between them.
"I do not mind that Sastre has the same objectives. It will depend on how things go, then we'll decide who will end up helping."
It doesn't look like the two Grand Tour hopes are having any problems getting to know each other and forming a relationship.
"I knew Carlos previously, but not very well. We get on well though, and our relationship is improving every day."
On the topic of a possible departure from the snubbed Italian team, Menchov is quick to dispel the notion and confirms that he wishes to stay.
"I am very happy with Geox. It is a good group with nice people."
One has to wonder what Menchov must be thinking about his current situation. He left a perfectly solid ProTeam in Rabobank, where he was the leader, at least for another year or so until the full on arrival of Robert Gesink, and now, he's left hoping that his team gets one, hopefully two invitations to this year's Grand Tours.
There's little the rider who lives in Pamplona, Spain can do now though except prepare for the season ahead and begin his build ups to the Giro and Vuelta with the idea that his team will be racing them.
Ahead of what will hopefully be his season's first big appointment in May, the Tour of Italy, Menchov has a spare, but focused schedule.
Menchov will show off his new Geox-TMC kit for the first time at the Challenge Mallorca in a few weeks time, then follow that with two more Spanish races: the Ruta del Sol and the Volta a Catalunya. Menchov won't take part in either the Tour of the Basque Country or the Ardennes Classics, preferring instead to continue his preparations for the Giro in peace and quiet, before taking in his final pre-Giro prep race, the Tour de Romandie.
Menchov can't help but look at his fortune with a slightly bitter eye. The seemingly likely absence of Alberto Contador in the 2011 Tour de France would open the door wide for the three-time Grand Tour champion to have a great chance at win number four. In his and Contador's absence, Menchov sees Ivan Basso and Andy Schleck as the likely big favorites for victory in the Grand Boucle.