Nairo Quintana unveils his strategy to blow up the Giro d'Italia 2025: "My approach is to go for stages"

Nairo Quintana won the Giro d'Italia in 2014 and finished second in 2017, so he knows how to succeed in the race for the pink jersey. He didn't return until last year, when, despite arriving far from his best form, he came close to taking a stage (only a ridiculous attack from Tadej Pogacar prevented it) and ended up getting into the top 20 overall.

This season the plan seems to be the same as last year: try to win a stage and help as much as he can the overall leader of Movistar Team: his compatriot Einer Rubio.

In an interview with the AS newspaper, on the rest day of the race that took the cyclists from Albania to Italy, Nairoman confirmed the objectives set before the race.

"Yes, my approach is to go for stages. For me there are days that are interesting, where a breakaway can come and I can be there to contest. Teamwork will be very important to take Einer forward, to have a good overall result at the end of the race."

Quintana explains that Movistar Team's overall goal in the Giro 2025 is to win a stage, considering how complicated it is to get a podium.

"Yes, the idea is to look for opportunities to get a stage win for the team. We know that the overall is quite complicated, just like being on the podium. We'll see how Einer works day by day, because we'll have to be close to him in those finishes where there are few people left, also to be in breakaways, to compete in mountain stages."

He gives some tips to achieve victories, "We have Cepeda, Formolo, whose strength we know very well. We're going to go to war, taking advantage of the fact that we don't have the great objective of winning the Giro because we are aware that there will be rivals who are far superior to us in the general classification.

He, for his part, does not put any pressure on himself, "I'm taking it day by day, doing a general job that is valid and important for the team. Time will tell, as will my body and my head".

"No, I live in the present. Whatever comes out for me is a great prize, a joy. Now I'm starting my 21st grand tour and I'm doing it with the same excitement as when I did my first one. The same nervousness, that tingling in the stomach. It's exciting. I was able to take advantage of some good years, to do very well, and now I try to pass on my knowledge, besides continuing to enjoy it," concluded the former Giro winner.