Juan Pedro López believes Lidl-Trek can contest Grand Tour wins in 2024: "We will try, we have Tao, Ciccone, Skjelmose"

Juan Pedro Lopez faces a new season as a consolidated Lidl-Trek rider and will do so by returning to race the Giro d'Italia, the grand tour he is best at and where he was maglia rosa for several days a couple of years ago. He believes in the team's potential to perform in them.

In an interview with Marca, the Andalusian climber talks about his goals, his complicated 2023 due to a crash and the new Lidl-Trek, which has become one of the strongest teams in the WorldTour and is aiming for even more results in the 2024 season.

NEW LIDL-TREK

"It's a totally changed team, totally new. Because of the change of riders and because of the hunger we have for races and to start with this new project that already started last year, but it has not been until now when we started with all the changes."

CALENDAR

"I'm going to start soon. I'm going back to a race that I like a lot like the Tour Down Under, where I made my debut with Trek. Then the preparation will be focused again on the Giro. I'll do UAE Tour, then a high altitude training camp, Tour of the Alps and Giro. After that, we'll see how we do the second part of the season."

COMPLICATED 2023

"It started with a lot of shadows, with the fall and the broken collarbone. I had a lot of problems to feel like myself again. For several months I had a hard time riding in the peloton, on the descents... a little bit of everything. I was even afraid to train with my group mates. I was afraid to let go, like a child does, to let go of my hands on the handlebars. It was a bad time for me. I was treating it with psychologists and professionals. It took me a long time to get over it, but I got over it. I don't give my season a 10, but at the end of the year, in La Vuelta, although I lacked a little, I did find the sensations of being myself again".

NEW TEAMMATES

"You can see that it is a totally new team, that they come from everywhere. I am happy for this change that the team has made, they have bet on strong riders like Tao [Geoghegan Hart]. All the riders have a great ambition this year to try to fight to be among the best in the world. We want the racing to start.

WINNING A GRAND TOUR?

"We're going to try. We have Tao, Ciccone, Skjelmose...they are three pretty strong riders for the overalls. We'll see how the year goes."

Article written by Juan Larra.