Vincenzo Nibali has confirmed that he will ride the Giro d’Italia in 2017, his first season with the new Bahrain-Merida team, though he will not decide on his participation in the Tour de France until after the corsa rosa.
The 100th edition of the Giro will spend two days in Sicily in the opening week, with a summit finish at Mount Etna and a finish in Nibali’s hometown of Messina the following day. Nibali was widely expected to return to defend his title, but stopped short of confirming as much during last month’s presentation in Milan.
“I’ll be there. The 100th Giro will be the main objective of my season,” Nibali told Sudpresse. “It’s a special edition of the race, I’m the defending champion and, what’s more, it goes through my home region.
“As for the Tour de France, we’ll see after the Giro. It’s not all defined yet, but I’m going to start in January with the new Tour de San Juan in Argentina. Then I’ll go to Abu Dhabi, before coming back to Italy to ride Tirreno-Adriatico.”
Nibali has made no secret of his desire to add Liège-Bastogne-Liège to his palmarès, but after a low-key showing in the race in 2016, he suggested that La Doyenne is not certain to feature on his schedule next season. “I’ll need to talk about it with my coach Paolo Slongo when we determine my full calendar for the first part of the season. Of the Classics, Il Lombardia is the one that suits me the best, but La Doyenne fascinates me…”
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