Pello Bilbao: 'Nairo Quintana deserves a second chance'

Basque allrounder Pello Bilbao (Bahrain Victorious) argued strongly that Nairo Quintana deserves a second chance after the veteran Colombian climber’s hiatus season in 2023 that followed his double positive for tramadol in the 2022 Tour de France.

Quintana is now back in racing in 2024 after returning to his former team Movistar and already training with the team in Calpe, Spain after being without a team for the 2023 season.

The former Giro d'Italia and Vuelta a España winner was legally allowed to race but unable to secure a contract for this season after two positive tests for tramadol led the UCI to disqualify his results from the 2022 Tour de France. 

The use of tramadol in competition was barred by the UCI in 2019, but it will only be added to the WADA banned list from January 1, 2024 and did not lead to a suspension for Quintana.

"Personally, I'm in favour of teams being strict about subjects like this one, and these kinds of errors can't be permitted," Bilbao told El País .

"But at the same time, I believe in second chances and it seems that Nairo has really shown what he wants and has fought for it really hard. He's stayed in form for a year, training with no other objective than to get back into the sport."

"I have to admit that side of it, that attitude he's had. I can't say he doesn't deserve another chance, he does deserve it and I'm pleased that Movistar have given it to him."

Bilbao also talked about his 2024 schedule, confirming he is set to skip the Giro d’Italia for a second year running in favour of the Tour de France despite the Italian Grand Tour being "where I’ve enjoyed myself most a racer".

In his 15 Grand Tours, Bilbao has taken his best GC results in the Giro, garnering fifth in the 2020 and 2022 races as well as sixth in 2018 and two stages in 2019.

However, the 33-year-old said that after taking his first ever Tour de France stage in the 2023 race - one with a huge emotional significance following the death of teammate Gino Mäder in the Tour de Suisse - he has opted to skip the Giro for a second year running.

"I'm sad not to be doing the Giro because it's the race which I've enjoyed the most and which has brought me the most success, the one in which I found myself as a racer," Bilbao told El País.

"But I'm not doing it. I prefer to focus my energies on a single objective. Up to now, I had a mentality of staying consistent throughout the season. But I want to look for clear goals so I can get a stage win like the one in this year's Tour."

Bilbao insisted that he had "never wanted a victory as badly" as the stage he took to honour teammate Mäder in this year's Tour and that probably "not even winning a Monument" would produce the same intensity of feeling in the future.

But he also argued that in the upcoming season, he did not want to motivate himself through other people's heightened expectations of what he could achieve. Even if he would like to win another stage in the Tour de France.

"I don't think many people like pressure and I don't like it at all. And I don't like being in the limelight either," he said.

"There are some riders whose egos get hurt when they're not seen as favourites or whatever, but it's nicer when people are surprised to see you up there. For me, that's not at all negative."

Life without Mikel Landa

Fellow-Basque Mikel Landa's exit this winter from Bahrain Victorious for Soudal-Quick Step has meant a change in his team's strategy for 2024, Bilbao recognised, arguing that "We're a team of opportunists, now, eh?"

"We're not going to have a definite leader in a lot of races, but we do have a team with a high allround level who showed that in a Tour de France, we can win with three different riders" - in 2023, Bilbao, Matej Mohoric and Wout Poels.

"Maybe we're lacking that key reference point, but which teams have a clear reference point that guarantees you'll win in all the top scenarios?" he asked rhetorically.

"If you've not got Remco (Evenepoel), (Jonas) Vingegaard or Tadej (Pogačar), then it feels like you're limited to fighting for the podium. And I like the idea of fighting for stage wins rather than a fight for the podium when you can't think about overall victory."

Bilbao also said that he would be looking for a stage victory in the Vuelta a España to complete his Grand Tour 'set' of wins, but that the overriding priority for 2024 would be the Tour de France and he would only decide about racing the Vuelta after July.