Peter Sagan in the La Datcha kit(Image credit: Courtesy of Polartec-Kometa)
Something has Peter Sagan laughing(Image credit: Courtesy of Polartec-Kometa)
Peter Sagan in his 2016 world champion's kit(Image credit: Courtesy of Polartec-Kometa)
Peter Sagan wins the UCI World Championship Road Race in Richmond.
Peter Sagan modelling the training kit(Image credit: Courtesy of Polartec-Kometa)
Peter Sagan (Tinkoff) has said that while he would like to claim his first victory at the Tour de San Luis next week, his priority is the spring. Sagan is making his third appearance at San Luis but is yet to take a stage win, scoring a second place in each of his previous attempts.
A victory in San Luis would also be his first in the rainbow stripes but Sagan was in a relaxed mood during the pre-race press conference on Saturday morning and refused to put pressure on himself by setting a specific target for the race.
“My main focus is on the Classics and I hope that I am not in the best shape now. I hope that I will have my best shape for the Classics,” Sagan said. “In the last two times I have had two second places. I’ve never won and maybe this year it will be different but we will see. The race is in January so we have to see what the level of the other guys is, and then we will see how it goes.”
Going up against Sagan in the sprints will be Elia Viviani, who is riding for the Italian selection, and last year’s revelation Fernando Gaviria (Etixx-QuickStep). There will be several opportunities for Sagan to take a stage win with four potential sprint days, including the stage 5 to Juana Koslay where he scored those two second places. Sagan will not have to shoulder the focus of the entire team as he will take joint leadership of the Tinkoff team with Rafal Majka, who is making his debut at the race.
Following the Tour de San Luis, Sagan will remain in South America and travel to Brazil to recon the Olympic course in Rio de Janeiro. He is yet to decide whether or not he will target the Olympic road race in what is set to be a very busy season in the rainbow stripes.
“Now I am here and like every year I want to do the classics, for sure then I will do the Tour of California, the Tour de Suisse and the Tour de France,” he explained. “After that we will see because it is a long way in the future but the Olympic Games I don’t know. I am going to see the course after San Luis. I have heard that it is a very hard parcours. The World Championships is a flat parcours, but it is a long year so we will see if I am able to do everything that is in the schedule.”
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Born in Ireland to a cycling family and later moved to the Isle of Man, so there was no surprise when I got into the sport. Studied sports journalism at university before going on to do a Masters in sports broadcast. After university I spent three months interning at Eurosport, where I covered the Tour de France. In 2012 I started at Procycling Magazine, before becoming the deputy editor of Procycling Week. I then joined Cyclingnews, in December 2013.
