With a fourth place within the Tour de France in 2021 then a fourth place within the Giro d’Italia this May, it’s maybe not so shocking that Ben O’Connor’s high precedence for the Vuelta a España is to not repeat the identical putting. Even if it means ending additional down the general.
“I’m a bit sick of fourth, it’s form of the worst place,” O’Connor mentioned as he awaited the beginning of his third Vuelta a España and tenth Grand Tour of his profession.
“You’re shut however not shut sufficient. I hope in three weeks time in Madrid I’ll have that large smile of ending on the rostrum, feeling happy with myself and happy with what we’ve accomplished with the crew. Just like we’ve got been feeling all season.”
Were he not in a position to end on the Vuelta podium, as he put it, “I’d take fifth over fourth.”
O’Connor’s first race again from the Giro this May got here with a late call-up for the Olympics Road Race, changing the injured Luke Plapp and ending 51st. If his Paris efficiency maybe got here too quickly in his autumn buildup, a subsequent eleventh place within the Clásica San Sebastian boded nicely for the Vuelta a España. And other than his main GC targets this August, O’Connor mentioned he’s additionally seeking to spherical off his Grand Tour stage wins ‘set’ with a victory in Spain.
“I loved being at residence,” the 28-year-old mentioned. “I wanted a break after a heavy begin to the season. I’m fairly prepared now to get into the second half.
“La Vuelta at all times has a little bit of a special vibe. It’s gonna be a reasonably enjoyable race, there are at all times questions on whether or not the break can win or not, or will the GC guys take an opportunity to win levels.”
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“Hopefully I can go for a little bit of each [breaks and GC]. A stage win could be nice after those I acquired within the Tour and the Giro.”
O’Connor final raced the Giro-Vuelta mixture in a single season again in 2019, taking thirty second and twenty fifth, respectively, and plenty of water has flowed beneath the bridge since then. Even in 2019, he did take a promising sixth on one of many hardest levels in Asturias, on the Alto de Acebo, received by Sepp Kuss as his first Grand Tour stage win.
“The wonderful thing about the Vuelta is that it has a mix of tremendous laborious summit finishes and medium mountain levels. Equally, there might be 12 or 13 GC levels, the place you may get time or lose time total. So there are many levels the place you might be opportunistic,” O’Connor identified on Thursday,
The different large distinction, actually in contrast with the Giro d’Italia of 2024, is that the climate is predicted to be rather a lot hotter, significantly within the south of Spain within the first week. Temperatures, already within the low to mid-30s Celsius in Lisbon, are set to rise to 37 levels on Monday and within the Spanish areas of Extremadura and Andalucia, the place the Vuelta returns on Tuesday, they don’t seem to be prone to drop a lot decrease.
“I’ve solely ever had one unhealthy day within the warmth, again on the Ventoux in 2021. Generally, I don’t have any points there,” O’Connor mentioned. “We all put together for the warmth in our personal methods, and though I received in Tignes [in the Tour de France in 2021] within the chilly and rain, I’d have most well-liked it to have been hotter that day!”
The climate is one issue that O’Connor can’t management, one other is the absence or presence of specific rivals. And within the case of the Vuelta, the shortage of biking’s present high two GC Grand Tour names, Jonas Vingegaard (Visma-Lease a Bike) and Tadej Pogačar (UAE Team Emirates), might create a extra open race. But O’Connor’s standpoint was, “it doesn’t change rather a lot”, as he identified on Thursday,
“You nonetheless should be on the entrance, there could also be extra alternatives. To be sincere, I couldn’t care much less,” he mentioned.
With or with out Vingegaard and Pogačar, O’Connor’s 2024 Vuelta experience, in any case, with have one thing of an end-of-an-era really feel to it, as will probably be his final for Decathlon-AG2R La Mondiale previous to shifting onto Jayco-AIUIa subsequent season.
Given a lot of his improvement as a GC rider has include the French WorldTour crew, a podium end in Madrid would definitely deliver the curtain down on the West Australian’s time there in a memorable style. Not to say placing a cease to these annoying fourth locations total, too.
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