Alberto Contador’s long-rumoured move to Trek-Segafredo for 2017 has been confirmed by the American team. The Spanish rider has told Cyclingnews about his chapter with Tinkoff team, the end of this season and his main goal for the 2017 season too.

During the Tour de France, Contador crashed two times before withdrawing from the race. A few days ago, El Pistolero finished fourth at the Vuelta a Espana after losing time in the first week. 

"It's true that it wasn't a very good Vuelta. I didn't achieve my goal, because the only goal that I had was to take victory, it was not a question of the podium. From the first day, it was a bad race. The race was really against me but I wanted to continue right up to the finish. My body paid the price for the crash but, finally, I am happy, because I enjoyed the race a lot with the fans. I wasn't so happy with the result but cycling is like this and at times things don't go how you want", he explained. 

On stage 15, he decided to go all-in. "I started to think about that day after one kilometre of descent on the Aubisque, after the finish of the stage. From that moment, I had that attack in my mind. I wasn't happy when I finished the Aubisque stage because I felt good during the stage but the result was not good and I lost time to all of my rivals. Going head to head with riders like Froome and Quintana, I was missing something to them. The others, because they started moving around and accelerating, I fell back. I came to the Vuelta to race and after one kilometre of descending the Aubisque, I was already thinking about it."

He has confirmed that he wil close his chapter with Tinkoff at the Abu Dhabi Tour.

"I can say only good things about Tinkov. He has offered me a lot during the last five years. I'm very thankful for this. During that time, there have been a lot of changes, especially when Bjarne left the team. In general, I'm happy with my whole time with this team. It has been a very good time and I will wear this jersey with pride until the last day of December."

"You don't really work with Oleg, you work with the staff of the team. Oleg is someone that you don't really know. He's a very passionate person when it comes to cycling, and with that passion he lives life intensely. There are probably people who are with him and who are against him but I think cycling has to be thankful for him. He has put a lot of money into cycling. Now, cycling teams are very expensive and what he did was really important."

Next year, he will wear the Trek-Segafredo jersey, a new exciting project for El Pistolero.

"I think, and I hope, that I have made the right decision. The decision was made with a sporting point of view; this is a team that I have the best feeling with. We have similar goals for next season, and the fundamental thing is that they have a very strong team with riders for all sorts f terrain. They have taken on some very important riders and the staff know how to win the big races. The other important thing is the equipment, which I know very well. I have been with Trek before (at Discovery Channel and Astana - ed) and that is also very important."

Contador has confirmed that he will be at the start of the next Tour de France.

"I am a rider who likes to race the whole year, not just one race, whether it's the Tour or the Vuelta or whatever. But, for sure, my number one objective next year will be the Tour again. If I didn't believe that I still had the ability to win the Tour de France then I would finish cycling."