Former Tour de France champion plans to join Tadej Pogacar for this year's Milano-Sanremo

Milano-Sanremo, as the first Monument on calendar, always attracts wide range of top riders who want to test themselves on the famous hills; Cipressa and Poggio. While the main narrative of La Primavera will once again revolve around Tadej Poagacar's attempt to finally shake off Mathieu van der Poel and add this traditional race to his palmares, there should be another Tour de France champion at the start of the race's 116th edition.

Italian outlet Gazzetta dello Sport informs that Geraint Thomas is expected to be one of the unexpected names to appear at the start in Pavia. Thomas is not entirely unfamiliar with the Italian Monument, having participated five times between 2011 and 2016, with his result a 31st place in 2015. Afterwards, the INEOS Grenadiers rider fully switched to role of a mountain domestique, and later became a GC leader himself, winning the 2018 Tour de France.

Now in his final year as a pro, Thomas plans to tick off some empty boxes in his career as well as revisit some "cool" races that he overlooked in the past. The nearly 300 kilometers long race was obviously not high on his list of priorities as a leader for standings at Grand Tours, but now he made his intention to start at Milano-Sanremo clear with a self-explaining selfie from Cipressa that was posted on his socials.