It is a sign of Alberto Contador’s stature within the sport that despite winning the Giro d’Italia this season, the year closed with a slight tinge of disappointment for the Spaniard after he missed out on victory in the Tour de France.
After all, this was the campaign in which the multiple Grand Tour winner was transfixed with the aim of winning the Giro-Tour double, a feat that had not been achieved since the late Marco Pantani in 1998, and one that no other rider of Contador’s generation has dared to even contemplate. As it stands, Contador plans on making 2016 his final season in the professional ranks, with the Tour de France firmly in his crosshairs. Chris Froome, Nairo Quitana and Fabio Aru, watch out.
We find Contador, of all places, in Porec, a small idyllic sea-front resort in Croatia where Tinkoff-Saxo are gathering for an end of season debrief. It’s gone eight o’clock in the evening and Contador, having just concluded a press conference, is sat in a quiet corner of a hotel bar, his relaxed demeanour a stark contrast to the ferocious competitiveness he has become famed for on the bike.
“I’m happy because I won a very beautiful, and very hard race,” Contador opens with, pointing to the Giro d’Italia that he won back in May.
“It’s a race that only a few cyclists in the world have won but of course the objective was the Giro and Tour.”
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Fast forward to July and Contador was more of a sputtering spent force than an all-out contender. He suffered when Froome accelerated on the Mur de Huy in the first week and then capitulated once more on stage 10 – the first proper summit finish of the race. The podium remained a realistic and admirable possibility but the brutal Giro, along with a crash in the Alps, saw Contador slip to fifth by the time the race reached Paris – coincidently the same position he finished in back in 2011, when he last rode the Giro and Tour.
“I was tired in the Tour and couldn’t be at the right level," he says. "During that race it wasn’t a question of my head being in the right place, I was mentally 100 per cent but it was a really hard race. Astana were very aggressive at the Giro and then maybe between the Giro and Tour, when I raced again, maybe I could have done that differently but overall I’m happy.”
Memories fade and Froome’s Tour demolition and Dumoulin’s Vuelta a Espana downfall are fresher to recount but this Giro d’Italia was arguably one of the most memorable editions of the race in recent years. Contador’s performance oozed tactical nous as much as it did prowess in the saddle – features that were demonstrated perfectly on the stage to Aprica. That day, Contador found himself on the back foot, with Astana’a blitzkrieg approach threatening to turn the race on its head and eliminate the Spaniard from the GC picture.
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