After failing to show any signs of life at Paris-Nice, Rafal Majka has said that recent severe comments made about the Tinkoff-Saxo team and its riders are justified. The team has suspended Bjarne Riis from his role of DS, and the team that has cost megabucks to build has only yielded two wins in 2015: Contador winning a stage in Andalucia and Sagan taking the final road stage in Tirreno-Adriatico.

“In every team wins count, so Mr Tinkov's position isn’t surprising. I do my best to achieve the goals during races. The pressure is always high, but I wouldn’t say it's discouraging. Sometimes it helps to mobilize and helps you give it 110%,” he said to rowery.org.

Majka has always been talented and the 25 year old Pole showed good form in 2013 and early 2014, finishing sixth and seventh in the last two Giros and third in the 2014 Il Lombardia. But it was during summer 2014 where he really announced himself not just as a man of the future, but of the present two, taking two stage wins and the GC at the Tour of Poland on the back of a double stage win and Polka Dot Jersey for King of the Mountains at the Tour de France.

He started well in 2015, with fourth in the queen stage of the Tour of Oman and in GC, but then he suffered on the roads of France.

“After Tour of Oman my numbers were really good. But then I did a hard training block and I couldn’t rest properly before Paris-Nice,” Majka said.

“I lacked freshness, my shape was far from optimal. I can't blame bad luck for that, I just didn't have the legs. But that's gone now, I'm focused on the next races," the climber from Zegartowice said ahead of Volta a Catalunya where he joins forces with Alberto Contador.

Majka wont be at the Giro this year, instead riding the Tour once more before he gets his shot at leading Tinkoff-Saxo at the year’s final Grand Tour, the Vuelta a Espana.