Dutch champion Danny van Poppel starts his season in Australia

“I often struggled with those two intercontinental trips,” says the 32-year-old Van Poppel. “That’s why I said I really don’t want to do the UAE Tour this year. Instead, I’ll be training during the first weeks of February. Then, for the first time in years, I’ll race the Opening Weekend again. In recent years, I was on the bench thinking, ‘oh, those are almost the only classics—along with Gent-Wevelgem—where riders like me can still make a difference.’ So I’m happy about that.”

Van Poppel started training in late November, so he doesn’t have much time to sharpen his form heading into the Tour Down Under. “I have a bit of a ‘how am I going to do this?’ feeling. But I’m getting a full sprint train with me to Australia, which I think is fantastic. I’m going all in. After the Opening Weekend, I’ll do an Italian block with Tirreno-Adriatico and Milan-San Remo. Then follows Gent-Wevelgem before I go to a high-altitude training camp targeting the Giro d’Italia.”