Esteban Chaves did a great 2015 season with two stage wins at the Vuelta a Espana. The Colombian rider also finished 5th overall. According to Cyclingnews, he will target the overall classification in next year's Giro d'Italia.
"We're going to confirm our plans in the next couple of weeks but that's currently what we are thinking," team director, Matt White told Cyclingnews. "We'll look over the profiles in more detail, but my initial thoughts are that Esteban is a proven three-week GC guy and he has certainly shown this at the Vuelta this season. I know he is highly motivated to go to the Giro and the Vuelta next season to build on this season's performances."
This year, Chaves rode the Giro d'Italia but he didn't target the GC and finished 55th. "You've got to aim high, and if you'd said to us as a team at the start of the year that Esteban was going to finish fifth at the Vuelta, when there was such a high calibre of GC field there, we would have been pleasantly surprised. However, what he's shown this year is his ability to back up his performances for three weeks. He had shown his class already but that key development that he showed at the Vuelta means we can go to a Grand Tour next year and aim for top five again, and why not aim high? The podium would be the ultimate at this stage of his progression."
Chaves will be present in Italy in May and the Yates brothers will have the chance to lead the Australia team in France in July: "Are we ready to ride GC at the Tour with either of the Yates brothers next season, who knows, but we have eight months until the Tour, and with the way they've ridden this year I wouldn't put out of the question. What they've shown this year is that they can win big one-day races and compete in the biggest WT events. We'll go into the Tour with an open book and if GC doesn't work out this time around we'll go into stage-hunting mode in the mountains."
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