It ain't July and it ain't the Tour but I'm kinda up for the Giro d'Italia, which starts Friday, because Ryder Hesjedal, Canadian and past Giro winner, has a new team and apparently some big ambitions for a repeat win.
Hesjedal switched from the American Garmin team (which always seemed to need an American leader/star) to the very international Trek-Segafredo team. He seems to be their guy for the Giro this year. Lately Ryder has a record of blowing himself right out of contention in the early stages of grand tours, and then storming back into the top ten with exciting mountainside heroics in the last week. It seems to be on his mind:
I was on the front foot the year I won, from the beginning to finishing it off in the latter part of the race, and in the last two editions I was on the back foot, losing time to various situations, and I was able to still perform well in the latter part of the race. So ideally it's about not losing time in the early part, but everyone knows that's complicated. There's all sort of pitfalls that can happen. Hopefully with a little bit of luck, good riding, and a strong team we'll get through the first half. Yeah, it's all about staying out of trouble.Image: Trek-Segafredo.
