José Joaquín Rojas will join Alejandro Valverde at the Giro d'Italia. The sprinter has designed a schedule with five stage races and three one-day races before he travels to the Italian grand tour.

Rojas underwent surgery for cardiac arrhythmia on November 18. He has been suffering from Wolff-Parkinson-White syndrome but has already returned to normal training.

According to Onda Regional de Murcia, he will have the following schedule: Tour Down Under, Vuetla a Murcia, Clasica de Almeria, Volta ao Algarve, Paris-Nice, Milan-San Remo, Volta a Catalunya, Vuelta a Castilla y León and the Giro d'Italia.

Hence, Rojas will return to a happy hunting ground in Australia where he first rode in 2006. He did the Tour Down Under every year between 2008 and 2014, finishing third in 2008 and 2009 and getting close to a stage victory on numerous occasions. As opposed to this, he has only done the Giro once, in 2007 when he abandoned.