Jose Goncalves and his then Caja Rural teammate Omar Fraile were the undoubted stars of the Vuelta a Espana in 2015 along with the stars of the GC, taking it to the bigger names for their small team, with Goncalves walking away with numerous placings and Fraile the mountains jersey. In-between racing in Valencia and his next outing at the Classic Sud Ardeche, the 27 year old from Portugal spoke with CyclingQuotes about his aims for 2016.

Goncalves, who won a stage of his home Volta a Portugal in 2015 (he also took a second stage a few days after his first but was relegated for illegal sprinting), told CyclingQuotes that the only way he could describe his first year at Caja Rural was “really fantastic”.

His Vuelta performance, which was four top five stage finishes, two of them as stage podiums and seventh and eighth on the Points and Mountains Classifications, was even more impressive as it was his debut Grand Tour.

“I didn’t know how my body would react in a race of three weeks because it was my first Grand Tour and whether or not it would go well in the third week. Finally, when it was over, I was very surprised how well I finished the Vuelta,” he told CyclingQuotes.

After a strong finish to 2015 after a sluggish start to the season last year, he is looking to get off to a good start with his first big goals of the year. He revealed that the first part of his calendar “is focused on Tirreno-Adriatico and Vuelta al Pais Vasco”, both of which are new experiences for him.

His next big aim is "to make the Rio Olympic Team for the road race", where he can be a great help to Rui Costa, or even, given his similar qualities, be a plan B if the usually reliable Costa hasn’t recovered from the Tour de France well. The only downside for Goncalves is that he races for a Pro Continental team, so he wont be able to use the Giro or Tour to build up his level. A return to the Volta a Portugal is likely, as it is ten stages long.