Wary after a difficult Tour de France, Irish pro Nicolas Roche has said that he hopes to perform strongly in the Vuelta a España, but admits that he isn’t certain what his condition is like.
“It is difficult to say, I haven’t done any racing since the Classica San Sebastian,” he told VeloNation today, speaking from the team hotel in Spain. “But I certainly do feel better ever day. Out training, I don’t feel as tired as when I was at the Tour. Hopefully things should go well, although for now I have to be discrete about my expectations.”
Last year he posted his best Grand Tour performance to date, finishing a fine seventh overall. He was just two minutes one second off the third place of Peter Velits (HTC Highroad) and had his time trial gone better, might have fought for a place on the podium.
Roche didn’t have a time trial bike to train on at that point but last winter he received an extra machine from his Ag2r la Mondiale team and has been working hard. However any technique gains have been hard to judge as he has had a difficult season due to several periods of injury, with the most recent related to a bad crash in the Critérium du Dauphine. The net result is that he hasn’t been able to perform at the same level as in 2010.
It’s been a source of frustration for Roche, who until now has made a steady improvement year after year. At the end of last year he was the clear leader of the Ag2r la Mondiale team, and appeared on the cusp of a very big season in 2011. He’s been on the back foot all year, though, and went into the Tour de France with fingers crossed that he would build form as the race progressed.
Instead, he became more tired towards the end. Aside from an aggressive ride on the mountain stage to the Col du Galibier, he was much quieter than in 2010; he finished 26th in Paris as opposed to 15th one year earlier.
“Last year I finished the Tour in great form, this year I finished it completely f**ed,” he said, speaking frankly. “So it will be interesting to see if I have recovered.”
Grand Tour round two at the Vuelta:
After Paris, after a couple of days to clear his had, his attention turned towards the Spanish Grand Tour. He’d have loved a holiday at that point, a chance to put his bike and the frustrations behind him and clear his head, but had to keep pushing onwards.
“San Sebastian came straight after the Tour [the following weekend – ed.] and you couldn’t let go too much as the Vuelta was so close,” he said. “Last year we had an extra week before the start, an extra week of hard training in the middle, so things are a bit different. But hopefully all the work I did previously will pay off now.”
Although he doesn’t want to talk too much about his expectations, Roche does admit that he is, as always, ambitious. “I just don’t want to say too much beforehand…in three or four days I’ll know how good I am.” After Saturday’s team time trial in Benidorm, the riders will have a big test on stage four when they slug it out on the first mountain stage, a summit finish at Sierra Nevada.
Roche will know then if he is on track. There is one thing on his mind, though. “I’m not as skinny as I was last year,” he admits, showing that he would like to be a little lighter for the high mountains. “I’m like I was at the Tour, but last year I was skinnier again at the Vuelta. With all the tiredness and everything, I wasn’t able to lose that extra weight again…last year I was hyper motivated and that made the difference.”
Still, he’s done a lot of work this year and feels that at some point, it has to finally pay off. “I do feel much better now than when I finished the Tour,” he said. “When I am training, I feel like I have recovered. The question is, while I’ve recovered, am I going well on the bike? I’ll find that out in the first mountain stage….”