João Almeida finished last in the gruppetto on stage 1 of the Tour Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes on Sunday and struggled again during Monday's stage, admitting that he does not have any goals for the French race as he recovers from illness and tries to rebuild his form in the hope of targeting the Vuelta a España.
The UAE Team Emirates-XRG rider was expected to target the Giro d'Italia but opted not to race in Italy due to the effects of a virus. Almeida underwent blood tests following a subdued display at the Volta a Catalunya in late March. He was away from racing for nine weeks as he tried to reboot and train again.
"I don't have any goals, I'll see how I feel," Almeida told CyclingProNet before the stage 1 of the Tour Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes, the renamed Critérium du Dauphiné.
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"It's been ups and downs for me. I kept training for a while but things were not really going well. I stopped, then three or four weeks ago, I started training again and here I am. Now I'm feeling good, that's the most important thing."
Teammate Tadej Pogacar is targeting a fifth Tour de France victory in July but due to illness and injury, UAE have still to indicate their eight-rider roster. Isaac del Toro will ride alongside Pogacar at the Tour and leads at the Tour Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes, while the Slovenian will ride next week's five-day Tour de Suisse.
Pavel Sivakov, Nils Politt, Florian Vermeersch, Tim Wellens, Brandon McNulty and Felix Großschartner are all part of the UAE long-list for the Tour and many of them trained at altitude with Pogacar. However little it remains to be seen if Adam Yates, Jay Vine and Marc Soler, who all crashed out of the Giro on stage 2, will recover in time for Tour selection.
Almeida is also perhaps on the long-list or some kind of reserve but made it clear he would prefer to train and then ride the Vuelta.
"For me least, that's what is on my mind," Almieda said when asked about riding the Vuelta, where he finished second overall last year, rather than the Tour.
"I'm feeling well in training, things are going well. Hopefully I'll be at my level in the next month or two."
Last week Almeida was more specific when speaking to the Portuguese news agency Lusa.
"Personally, I feel I wouldn't be ready to do a Tour de France. There are many rough edges to smooth out to be at the level of a Tour; it's a very demanding race," said Almeida.
"Regardless of whether you're going to achieve a result or to work hard, you have to be in your best shape, because otherwise it's not possible to achieve much."
He also revealed a possible 2026 race calendar. It did not include the Tour de France but listed the Clásica San Sebastián, Vuelta a Burgos, the Vuelta a España and then the Road World Championships in Canada.
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