Ready for the Giro
Daniel Martin enters this year’s Giro d’Italia as the great outsider of the GC. He openly admits that he still hasn’t proved that he can perform regularly with the very best over three weeks of racing and this makes his performance very uncertain.
At the same time, he has mostly shined in one-day races and on shorter climbs where he can make use of his explosive climbing skills while he has had a harder time in the high mountains. This year’s Giro will obviously be decided in the final week which is loaded with long, regular climbs and it is another question how Martin will handle those strains.
Over the last year, the Garmin rider has stepped up his level massively and his performance in the last two editions of Liege-Bastogne-Liege and last year’s Il Lombardia prove that he is now one the world’s leading contenders for the hilly classics.
As a grand tour contender, however, he is almost a completely blank page. He has already done six three-week races but so far he has rarely had a focus on the overall standings. Instead, he has always underlined his approach of treating the races as 21 consecutive one-day classics and with stage wins in both the Vuelta and the Tour, he has proved that this way of handling the races has suited him well.
He has been in GC contention in a grand tour twice: in the 2011 Vuelta where he finished 13th overall despite his day-to-day approach, and at last year’s Tour de France where illness in the final week probably denied him a spot in the top 10. He had more bad luck at last year’s Vuelta when he crashed out of the race after getting the tour off to a solid start.
For the first time, Martin will start a grand tour with a clear focus on the overall standings when he rolls down the start ramp in Belfast. This time there will be no day-to-day approach. The goal is to finish as high as possible in the overall standings.
Of course it was the Irish start that prompted Martin to start the Giro and he has made the Italian grand tour his big target. For the first time ever, he has prepared himself for a race by training at altitude and he even decided to make the Ardennes classics less of a focus to be fully ready for the Giro, despite being the defending Liege champion.
Nonetheless, Martin’s splendid performances over the last two years make him one of the riders that can realistically target the overall victory. There’s a big risk that he can’t live up to expectations and will finish far down the rankings but this assessment is about winning potential, not top 10 chances. Martin enters the race as an almost blank piece of paper and an exciting outsider and it is now time for him to find out whether he has the potential to be a grand tour rider or if he should stay focused on a career as one of the world’s leading one-day riders.
We’re all looking forward to the big start in Belfast on Friday, May 9th. Go Dan!
Source: cyclingquotes.com – cyclingnews.com