Daniel Martin will be the Cannondale-Garmin leader during the next Tour de France. The Irish rider hopes to be at the top on this race and ha shis eyes set on the third stage. With the same steep finish atop the Mur, where he has twice finished in the top 5, he sees it as a "chance at redemption".

"Stage 3 stands head and shoulders above the rest of them. I just hope I can get to the bottom of the Mur set up weel for a victory. If that is the case I will be very optimistic", he explained according to Velonews. He thinks also to wear the yellow jersey. "The dream would be to stay close enough to aim for the yellow jersey on stage 3. That would be an ideal world. I just gotta stay out of trouble for the first two days too." In order to wear the general classification jersey, he will have to do a great individual time trial in Utrecht. Because of with the presence to puncheurs like Michal Kwiatkowski (Etixx-Quick Step) and Alejandro Valverde (Movistar Team), who time trial well and are sure to performe on the Mur, there will be plenty of contenders.

"It is a grand tour and will be raced differently to a classic. I really think it is going to come down to the hill sprint up the Mur and at the end of the day it may be a climb that suits me", he added. "I think it is going to be really important to have potential options for the time that first week could go very wrong. It will be very much to our advantage to have a few cards to play."

About the cobbles, Martin explained he did not recon the main sectors. "I am just going to fly bling. It is honestly probably best for me not to know. In training it would be different anyways."