Bardet: The Vuelta is a voyage into the unknown

The Vuelta a España's start in Nimes has provided Romain Bardet (AG2R La Mondiale) with at least some semblance of familiar surroundings, but France's most successful Tour de France racer in recent years had no qualms in recognising on Friday that he will be mostly fighting on very new terrain this August.

The 2017 Vuelta will be the first time, in fact, that Bardet has ridden a Grand Tour other than the Tour de France.

"I'm going a little bit the unknown," Bardet told reporters. "But I'm very happy with that and keen to see what the second Grand Tour of the year can offer.

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"It's the second part of the season and I'm maybe not as fresh as before the Tour, but hopefully I'll be able to show some kind of good condition. There are lots of hilly stages, so there will be lots of chances for me to show what I can do."

Second in the 2016 Tour de France and third in 2017, Bardet recognised that he had finished the Tour feeling very tired, and that he had needed to rest, first, but that after that, "I've done ten days good training before the Vuelta started."

As for the favourites, Bardet pointed to the logical top candidates of Chris Froome (Sky), Vincenzo Nibali (Bahrain-Merida), Alberto Contador (Trek-Segafredo) and Fabio Aru (Astana), the four riders who have won a Grand Tour in the past.

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