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PARIS: Tadej Pogacar believes he has the right team in place to help him fight for a third Tour de France triumph with an eight-rider UAE roster confirmed on Friday.
鈥淚t鈥檚 already my fifth time coming to the Tour and I鈥檓 really excited about it,鈥� said Pogacar, a back-to-back winner in 2020 and 2021 who finished runner-up in the past two editions to Jonas Vingegaard.
鈥淲e鈥檝e worked really hard all year as a team to prepare for this. We鈥檝e spent a lot of time together as a group training at altitude and put in a lot of hours in the saddle. We鈥檙e in a really good place as a group.鈥�
Pogacar, 25, will also be bidding for the Giro d鈥橧talia and Tour de France double, last achieved by the late Marco Pantani in 1998, with this year鈥檚 Tour starting in Florence on June 29.
The Slovenian will be accompanied by Britain鈥檚 Adam Yates, Spaniards Juan Ayuso and Marc Soler, France鈥檚 Pavel Sivakov, Portuguese Joao Almeida, Belgian Tim Wellens and Germany鈥檚 Nils Politt.
鈥淲e know what we have to do to support Tadej,鈥� said Yates, third in last year鈥檚 Tour de France.
鈥淲e鈥檙e aiming for the win and we know if things go our way it鈥檚 possible so it鈥檚 just a matter of staying focused and pulling together all the way to Nice.鈥�
Ayuso, winner of the Tour of the Basque Country and third in the 2022 Vuelta, and Almeida, third in last year鈥檚 Giro, will compete in their first Tour de France.