CHRIS FROOME is ripping up the record books by racing in both the 2018 Tour de France and the Giro d’Italia.
No rider has done the double since Marco Pantani in 1998, but Froome and Team Sky feel this season’s successful Tour/Vuelta efforts have them on course for the gruelling brace.
Froome will be on the Giro start line in Jerusalem on May 4 – his first appearance in the race since 2010 – and then will target his fifth Tour de France win in July.
The Brit said: “It’s a unique situation for me, having won the Tour and Vuelta and now having the opportunity to go to the Giro and attempt to win a third consecutive Grand Tour.
“It’s really exciting to be able to take on a new challenge, to do something that perhaps people wouldn’t expect and to mix it up.
“It’s a whole new motivation for me to see if I can pull off something special next year. I feel as if my cycling career started in Italy in some ways.
“I lived there for three years when I began my career as a professional, so having the opportunity to go back to the Giro in the position I am now in, and with the opportunity I have, feels in some ways like completing a circle.”
“It’s something the team have considered carefully and we’ve talked about a lot.
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“We know that it would be a significant feat in the modern era to win both the Giro and the Tour in the same season, but the way we managed things this year gives me confidence that I can successfully target both races.
“Another factor is that there is an extra week between next year’s Giro d’Italia and the Tour de France.
That’s one more week for recovery and for training than there would be normally, which I think potentially makes it more manageable and conducive to being able to hit both races in great shape.”
Victory at the Giro d’Italia would make Froome only the seventh rider in history to have won all three Grand Tours (Giro, Tour and Vuelta) in his career.
And Team Sky boss Dave Brailsford has backed the incredible bid and insisted a new chapter in the rich recent history of British cycling can be written in Italy.
Froome said: ““Some of cycling’s greatest stories have been played out at the Giro d’Italia and next year gives us the chance to write a chapter of our own.
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“We’ll be taking Chris to the Giro with the aim of winning three consecutive Grand Tours, and then going on to France with the goal of winning the Tour.
“It’s something that we have looked at in detail as a team. Some of the very best riders have attempted to win the Giro d’Italia and Tour de France in the same season but very few have been successful, so it’s a challenge we have enormous respect for.
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“But it’s challenges like this that speak to what we’re about as a team – setting ambitious targets, preparing for them properly and being ready to put it all on the line.
“Chris has established himself as one of the greats of our sport. He’s certainly one of its fiercest competitors, and the great competitors take on the biggest challenges.”
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