Although he had hoped to figure strongly in Paris-Nice and had the backing of Alexandre Vinokourov and the Astana team behind him, Roman Kreuziger had to be content with seventeenth overall in the World Tour event. The 24 year old finished the prestigious early-season race over seven minutes behind the winner Tony Martin (HTC Highroad). His best stage placing was sixteenth on the penultimate day of racing.
It was clearly not what he had anticipated, but he’s assessed his performance and accepted how things went. “I spoke with my trainer about it, with the people from Astana, but we don’t think we made mistakes,” he said. “I gave everything during training before the race, but I hadn’t enough power.
“I wanted to be better there, at least at top 10, but I lost a little bit in the mountains and also the time trial was disappointment for me. But as I said before the season, the Giro is my main goal for this year and I am doing everything to be on the podium there.”
Kreuziger has now a long period of training scheduled, and will use that time to build his form. He will spend three days in his home country of the Czech Republic, then return to his Italian base on Thursday. After four days there, he’ll fly to Tenerife on Tuesday for a high-altitude training camp, and will remain there until April 8th.
“I know this place very well, I trained there in previous years too,” he said. “When I will come back, we have a plan to check out some mountain stages of Giro, but that will depend on the weather. I hope that roads won’t be closed due to the snow.”
He is not due to race again until the Giro del Trentino, which begins over a month from now on April 19th. The four day race will conclude with two summit finishes and provide a good test of his form. He’ll then go on from there to ride the Tour de Romandie. The Swiss event runs from April 26th to May 1st and will likely be his final event prior to the Giro d’Italia.
With Vinokourov set to target the Tour de France and to command the full backing of the team, the Giro is the big goal for Kreuziger this year. “I want to be there in the best shape and fight for the podium,” he stated. “There will be a lot of favourites: Contador if he takes part, Menchov, Nibali, Scarponi, Rodriguez…but my goals are big!”
Previously a Liquigas rider, Kreuziger has twice finished ninth overall in the Tour de France. As he is only 24 years of age, he is tipped as a future contender in the race. His victories include the 2008 Tour de Suisse, the 2009 Tour de Romandie and last year’s Giro di Sardegna. He was also third in the 2010 Paris-Nice and fifth in the Amstel Gold Race. The potential is certainly there, and he’ll aim to deliver on that in two month’s time in the Giro.