'I want to ride for two or three more years but I'm not afraid of retirement'

Nicholas Roche. Photo by David Fitzgerald/Sportsfile

Ciaran Lennon Twitter Email

April 30 2021 11:50 AM

Nicholas Roche insists he’s not scared by the thought of retirement but he hopes to keep racing for “two or three more years”.

The 36-year-old Irish cyclist will start the 24th Grand Tour of his career when the Giro d’Italia begins in Turin on May 8 but with his contract at Team DSM running out at the end of the season, Roche is facing an uncertain 2022.

As the senior man on the team he will be road captain for the Italian Grand Tour where he will marshal his team leaders Romain Bardet and Jai Hindley, last year’s runner up, through the Corsa Rosa.

The two-time Grand Tour stage winner was reflecting on his long career as a professional in an exclusive Q and A event for Indepenent.ie last night.

“I’d be disappointed if it ended now, but if it does end I’m ready . . . not ready as in, ‘oh I’m going to retire that’s it’. I wouldn’t be happy about it. But I’m 17 years in the peloton, I’ve done what I’ve done, I’m not scared but I don’t want it,” he said.

Roche showed some strong form in last week’s Tour of the Alps, where he was second on the final stage, and hopes to have clarity over his future in the next few months.

“It’s still very early to talk about contracts, I’ve barely raced this year but hopefully things will start kicking in and getting some interest and by the summer have something sorted, but I definitely want to keep on going, at least, two or three more years.”

While Roche will park any personal ambitions next month, he is excited to be teaming up with French star Bardet for the Giro after waiting a long time to join forces again after they first crossed paths at AG2R.

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“We met in 2010, 2011 and when he turned pro he was the next big thing and I was the GC rider with the team,” said Roche. “He was looking at me with big eyes. But over the years we really kept good contact, he’s a really good friend of mine. And we always said when I was out of contract, or he was out of contract, ‘one day we need to get back together’. Things came pretty late but now the boxes are in place and I’m really excited to go for a GC battle and be his road captain.”

The road captain is a role he relishes and believes his previous position as team leader has helped develop his skillset as the team’s voice on the road. The senior role gives Roche the chance to influence team tactics and is a crucial link between the sports directors and the men in the race.

“I think I’ve learned more about being a helper because I’ve been a leader before. The only difference is you have to put your ego aside, because you’re not the star any more, you have to do the bottles, take the wind. You don’t have the same media interest or the results,” he said.

“It’s great to have this responsibility of managing the team, especially this team where the average age is 23. These guys are physically very talented but they just don’t have the feel for racing yet. You get that with racing, year after year after year.”

During an extensive interview, which covered the changing nature of the pro peloton and how he found a better life balance after dropping his general classification ambitions, he also revealed that some of the worst parts of his career were the moments when he felt cheated out of results.

“Over the years the worst part was the sensation of being cheated and that has happened in the past.

“I think today, it’s not that I worry about it, otherwise there’s no point competing, but there was a moment in my career where I was like, not fed up, but I was frustrated about it. And that was mentally challenging.”

Roche highlighted the 2010 Vuelta a Espana, a race he would ultimately finished seventh in overall, but had been competing for a place in the podium. Spanish rider Ezequiel Mosquera shocked a strong field to finish second overall but tested positive for hydroxyethyl starch, regarded as a masking agent for EPO. Mosquera was banned although later won a civil case in Spain to have his suspension annulled.

“I was fighting for the podium at the time and a few times he closed the gap on me or attacked and change the course of the race. It just happened that this guy was done for EPO later,” said Roche. “I was just angry. This guy was just cheating and he actually changed the outcome of my own race.

“I knew something was going on at the time, because it just wasn’t normal that this guy was just there (with the leaders). I was like ‘some day, one day (we’ll find out)’.”