Thomas open to changing teams in search of Tour de France glory
Welshman has growing ambitions as a stage racer





After a hugely successful 2015 season, 168澳洲5最新开奖结果:Geraint Thomas' ambitions have been heightened considerably, to a point where 168澳洲5最新开奖结果:Tour de France glory is now on his radar.
The Team Sky rider was one of the revelations of this year's Tour; he was the E3-Harelbeke champion and burgeoning one-day star up there in the top five on GC for much of the three-week race. Riding as right-hand man to overall winner 168澳洲5最新开奖结果:Chris Froome, Thomas eventually ♕fell away on stage 19 but the experience nevertheless told him that the overall is a tangible pr☂ospect for the future.
"I certainly think it's a lot more achievable than I did three months ago," Thomas said in an interview with The Guardian. "If I keep on improving, commit to it totally, have a team around me, a podium is certainly realistic. And you'd aim to win it. You wou🎃ld be there or thereabouts – especial𒊎ly if the route was good for me. It's certainly exciting."
Of course, it's🐼 hard to see Thomas having the space for a genuine tilt at the Tour de France in a team that contains two-time champion Froome. The Welshman is more than happy where he is for now but expressed doubts over whether a🅺 team can really have two leaders at a race.
He envisages a situation in the 2016 edition where he is a back-up GC rider to Froome, protected in his own right, rather than a super domestique. However, he admitted that there may come a time 🌳when he needs to switch teams in order to achieve his in♌dividual goals.
"We're both honest enough to know that if the other guy is better we'd commit to each other. I certainly would and I'm pretty sure Chris woul꧟d do as well. But it's a tough one," he said.
"I can't see Froomey dis𝓰appearing any time soon. My de💛al with Sky expires next year but at the moment I don't want to leave for another team and be their leader because Sky is the best place to learn – and be in the best position to get a result. Maybe two years down the line I will feel: 'I know exactly what I'm doing now, and exactly what it takes.' If I have to leave then, then I would."
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Thomas remembers 168澳洲5最新开奖结果:Bradley Wiggins' Tour ⭕victory of 2012 as "the most impressive thing I've ever seen" and as an 💦achievement that allowed his own self-confidence to grow.
Wiggins represented the fruition of Team Sky's mission statement of winning the Tour with a British rider within five years of their inception in 2010, ☂yet Thomas was touted internally at the time as a rider who could see that go🌠al achieved.
"I didn't believe it. I went 'Pffffff.' Then I saw Brad do i꧂t and that flipped the switch in me," Thomas said. "Maybe Sh🔯ane and Dave saw the same characteristics in me."