As he prepares for his first race of the season Sir Bradley Wiggins (Team Sky) is approaching 2014 with renewed optimism.

Following his disappointing Giro d'Italia and his exclusion from the Sky team at the Tour de France, Wiggins ended last season with frequent podium places and is hoping to continue that momentum into a new campaign that features a host of exciting goals.

As far as the early stages of the season is concerned Wiggins has singled out Paris-Roubaix and the Tour of California as his primary targets, with a view to making it to the Sky Tour de France squad in July.

“I’ve got quite a few goals,” he revealed to TeamSky.com. “I want to get back to winning races again, being like the old me instead of turning up at races and not being in the best frame of mind. I’d like to get back to the Tour de France and to make the team would be great. Grand Tours are still very much on my radar, maybe not for the overall, but certainly as being part of a successful team and contributing to that success.”

Wiggins said that he needed to make a return to the mental state of mind that saw him surge to the pinnacle of international cycling in 2012.

“I’m enjoying the lifestyle again, the training and the routine,” he admitted. “That’s what I missed the most and I found it frustrating when other stuff was getting in the way. I’m glad I’ve not had as busy a winter this year as I did the last. It’s been good.

“My enjoyment comes from having a routine, training hard, turning up at the races ready to race and then getting the results at the end of it. Once you’re in that mindset it becomes enjoyable. It’s not enjoyable when you’ve not been able to train as much as you want which means you go into races underprepared and then it’s hard in the races. Then you come away from them with your confidence knocked and you’re playing catch up for the next race.

“I want to stay on top of things constantly, and that process began at the start of December. Since then it’s been a really important block because it allowed me to build a good base with which to start the season.”

Even though a rain-drenched campaign saw Wiggins win in front of a home crowd at the Tour of Britain that win couldn’t hide the fact that the 2013 season will go down in the history books as one of unfulfilled ambitions for Wiggins. Something that a runner-up spot at the world individual time trial championship couldn’t redeem, either.

Asked to summarize his 2013 season Wiggins put his past season into a larger perspective and said that the fact that he had been able to finish the season on a positive note had given him additional motivation to return to winning ways in 2014.

“I think I’ll look back on it with a mix of disappointment and positivity. I almost needed a season like that to re-motivate myself for the next few years. The bubble had to burst at some point. I’d had such a good run for two years that 2013 was always going to be a difficult one.

“There was so much other stuff going on off the bike as well – things that other people would just never consider happened with success to do with family and things. They all have an impact on your training and your bike riding, and once I was told I wasn’t doing the Tour, because of my injury, I got to stop, have some time at home to reassess and think about all the things that brought me that success in the first place. That allowed me to go back to the drawing board and revisit things I was doing before.

“My season finished with me winning the Tour of Britain and then getting silver in the World Championships, so that led into me having a really good winter. I’m looking forward to winning again now whereas this time last year I didn’t have such a positive outlook.”

“That was a definite high point, and then the World Championship time trials. Finishing second on that day I know I couldn’t have given any more and I’m pleased I put that ride together and ended the season in a good, positive way.”