For the first time in a while, BMC’s Tejay van Garderen has opted for a purely European start to his season. He began with the Vuelta a Murcia and Clasica Almeria one –day races before riding the Ruta del Sol this week.

His season was ended in Spain at the Vuelta last year, when he crashed out as part of the same pile up that almost cost Lotto-Soudal’s Kris Boeckmans his life. The 27 year old American says his injuries are fully healed and he is ready to go in Spain once more.

“The crash was five months ago now, and the arm is healed, and everything’s good, I’ve been able to train well. I started to train a bit earlier than I normally would have because of the early off-season so I feel actually like I’m ahead of where I normally would be at this time of year,” van Garderen told Cyclingnews.

His reasoning for racing only in Europe is that when he gets to the bigger European stage races and stages in bad weather arrive, he isn’t as shocked as he would be if he had only raced in hot weather like he would do in the middle east.

“Sometimes it’s a shock going into those [European] races, because whereas before you’ve been in stages [like in Oman last year] being cancelled because of extreme heat, you’re then going to stages [in Europe] being cancelled because of snow.”

Following the Ruta del Sol, his next goal is Tirreno-Adriatico before Catalunya and Romandie come next. The Tour de France is once again the big goal for his season.

“I then do Catalunya, then I take a little break before heading to Romandie.” In each case, he will be going for a top placing overall. “The schedule’s laid out so I can go for the races in each one I do, I get a good amount of rest and recuperation between them. We have a plan so that for every race we go to we have a goal.”