Briton aiming for road race and time trial gold medal in Brazil plus third Tour title
Chris Froome wants a third Tour de France title in 2016 plus the gold medal in the Rio Olympic road race and time trial events (Image credit: Tim de Waele/TDWSport.com)
Chris Froome has outlined his 2016 goals in an interview with Sky Sports explaining he is aiming for a third Tour de France title and gold medals in the road race and time trial at the 2016 Rio Olympic Games.
The Team Sky rider won a second Tour title in July, adding to his 2013 triumph, but was forced to abandon the Vuelta a Espana with a fractured foot and time off the bike has made the 30-year-old hungry for success in France and Brazil next summer explaining it's "a massive goal to set and I think I'm just going to have to take each event as it comes, but it's exciting. It's really exciting," Froome told Sky Sports News HQ.
"It's going to be an exciting year, that's for sure. The main focus for me is going to be the Tour de France again, but just on the back of the Tour de France, we have got the Olympic road race over in Rio, and a few days following that, potentially the Olympic time trial is also on the cards. Both the road race and the time trial do suit me very well. The time trial has over 1,000m of climbing in it, so it's going to be a tough time trial. I think it's over 50km, so for an individual time trial, that is a long event."
In 2012, Froome finished second overall at the Tour behind teammate Bradley Wiggins before lining up in the road race and time trial at the London Olympic Games. With Great Britain riding for Mark Cavendish on the sprint friendly parcours, Froome finished the race in 109th place. In the time trial, Froome was third behind Tony Martin (Germany) and Wiggins who won't be defending his medal, preferring to focus on the team pursuit on the track.
Froome missed the Olympic road race warm up event, the Aquece Rio which was won by France's Alexis Vuillermoz, but explained he hopes to see the 256.4km course and undertake a reconnaissance before the August 6 race.
"I would love to get out to Rio and see the course. Whether there is the opportunity coming up soon to do that, or if we have to wait until next year, we still haven't worked that out yet, but I hope to get over at some point," he said.
The full route of the 2016 Tour de France will be unveiled in Paris on October 20 and from there, Froome will start to detail the specifics of his plan.
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"Like anything in cycling, it's really difficult to plan too far in advance. You never know what is going to happen along the way and, at this point, I just have to look at the Tour de France and say, 'I need to be ready at the point', and anything after that, I need to basically take it as it comes," he said of his current plans for 2016.
"It's going to be key to see what the Tour de France has in store for us next year. We are going to have the presentation later in October to see exactly what next year's route is going to look like, and from there we can start planning accordingly."
