Team Garmin-Barracuda to ride the Giro d’ Italia without Thomas Dekker
Thomas Dekker of Team Garmin-Barracuda was eyeing the Giro d’ Italia as an important goal of his 2012 season.
The cyclist was building up for the Italian Grand Tour slowly but had to face the disappointment as he crashed while riding the Liege-Bastogne-Liege 2012.
It was believed that he will recover in time to ride the Giro, but it appears as if the injury is serious than it seemed at first.
Dekker opened his 2012 winning account with a stage 2 win at the Tour of Qatar.
He was part of the strong Team Garmin that succeeded during the team’s time trial event of the race.
His second victory of the season came during the fifth stage of the Circuit de la Sarthe and Thomas was looking in supreme form to conquer the coming races of the season.
The crash has now ruled him out of the Giro d’ Italia as the cyclist believes that he is still not100 percent to ride the three- weeks long stage race.
“If I started, there would be too big a risk that I would have to pull out after a few days. It’s too much to start a Grand Tour if you’re not at 100 percent”.
Giro d’ Italia 2012 was a good opportunity for the Dutch to mark his return at the Grand Tour. His last appearance at a three-week race was in the Tour de France 2007.
Dekker is hopeful that he will be given a chance to ride at least one Grand Tour race of the season which could either be the Vuelta a Espana or the Giro d’ Italia.
“I’ve spoken with the team management and my programme has been overhauled, I’m still going to do a Grand Tour this year, either the Tour de France or the Vuelta a España”.
“It’s a pity because I would have liked to have done the Giro, but I’m glad that I’ve been able to set some new goals immediately,” he concluded.
The 27-year-old will now be seen in action at the Tour of Norway but only after he fully recovers from the injury.
The five-day Norwegian race is scheduled between May 16-20 and will be a real test for Thomas’ fitness.
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