Peter Sagan to make your mind up on 2021 Tour de France and Olympics participation just after Classics
The foreseeable future is unwritten. Peter Sagan should to have been readying himself to commence his period in Argentina afterwards this thirty day period at the Vuelta a San Juan, but as a substitute he faces a succession of instruction camps in advance of building his 2021 debut at Omloop Het Nieuwsblad and Kuurne-Brussel-Kuurne on the last weekend of February.
On Saturday, Bora-Hansgrohe directeur sportif Jan Valach recommended that the Slovakian was set to experience the Giro d’Italia, Tour de France, Tokyo Olympic Online games and Planet Championships in a packed 2021 programme, but Sagan advised reporters on Sunday that no conclusion has been taken about his routine over and above his typical rendezvous with the Classics.
“We’ll have to see what the plan will be,” Sagan mentioned in a video conference from the Bora-Hansgrohe schooling camp on Lake Garda.
“For now, I have a agenda up to the Classics. Soon after that, we have to see what I’m going to do. We have to make your mind up, for the reason that it’s a quite vital calendar year with the Olympic Video games and a Planet Championships [in Flanders] that could be superior.”
Sagan missed the rescheduled cobbled Classics past Autumn, preferring instead to incorporate the Tour with a Giro debut that experienced been planned extensive just before the coronavirus pandemic upended the calendar. He will return to the cobbles in March and April, but with the pandemic by now forcing revisions to the 2021 calendar, he insisted that it was premature to define a racing programme for the summer months.
“It is not positive. Like I stated, right after the Classics, we’ll see what is heading to happen. Now a lot of races are cancelled. We will see how we are likely to deal with this calendar year. I believe we nevertheless will need some time to strategy every thing,” mentioned Sagan, although he prompt that he would opt for the Tour de France in excess of the Tokyo Olympics should quarantine prerequisites compel him to opt for between the two races.
“If we have to make your mind up now, for guaranteed I’m heading for the eco-friendly jersey once more. But no person is aware what is heading to transpire. We might have to be in Japan two weeks right before, but with a vaccination there could be distinct principles, we continue to never know. We will see what is heading to happen in the future 5 months.”
Earlier on Sunday, Sagan’s teammate Emanuel Buchmann verified that he will goal the Giro d’Italia in 2021, though it has extensive been suggested that Bora-Hansgrohe would hand a Tour debut to sprinter Pascal Ackermann this period. Sagan neatly side-stepped a dilemma about whether or not his and Ackermann’s ambitions could co-exist in July.
“The Tour is still considerably absent, you know, and afterwards I will see what is going to be my agenda,” he mentioned.
“I feel also for Pascal, we will see what is going to be his program. We will see later. Till now, we are ready for the racing, but we are in a instant and a condition again in which some races are cancelled. We will see what is going to transpire following thirty day period.”
But if the Tour goes forward as planned?
“I won’t answer this issue, and you know why,” Sagan grinned. “If doesn’t exist.”
Opening Weekend
In the right here and now, Sagan is in Peschiera del Garda for a training camp with his Bora-Hansgrohe squad until finally January 17, and he will journey onwards for a different camp in Gran Canaria before transferring to altitude in Sierra Nevada in February.
“Following it really should be Nieuwsblad and Kuurne,” Sagan reported. “If it’s going to transpire, nobody is aware. But that is the program.”
By the time Sagan fleshes out the remainder of his racing programme in April, his potential over and above 2021 may also be made the decision. He is in the closing 12 months of his agreement with Bora-Hansgrohe, but it continues to be to be witnessed if he will continue to be with the German squad or transfer elsewhere.
“I believe it’s greater to ask this query to Ralph Denk or my agent Giovanni Lombardi, not to me,” explained Sagan. “I am quite delighted in this staff. I’m keeping a further 12 months and then we will see what’s heading to materialize.”
Sagan’s arrival at Bora in 2017 assisted to assurance the squad’s passage to the WorldTour, but Denk’s crew has develop into significantly less dependent on the three-time earth winner in the yrs because, significantly supplied the potent cadre of German riders on the roster, led by Buchmann, Ackermann and Max Schachmann.
“That is very good. The far more powerful men, the far better the team is,” explained Sagan, who smiled when questioned if his job had transformed over the a long time. “No, I’m however here.”