Alberto Contador will certainly hope to keep up the momentum carried from his impressive victory in Tirreno-Adriatico last week, as he is expected to clash with Christopher Froome (Team Sky) for the first time this season in the Volta a Catalunya starting today.

The Tinkoff-Saxo leader admitted to have felt fatigue following his showing in the Italian stage race, but reportedly have recovered well during a short stay at home and expects the Catalan event to be a very open affair given the last of individual time trial and time bonuses at stage finishes.

“I maintained the form from Tirreno which is good and I hope to recover well these days. I felt fatigued at home, I turned out to be more tired that I thought after Tirreno-Adriatico because of very demanding and long stages but I hope, after paying the prize at the start, to do well.”

“This morning a trained for a couple of hours around Calella and have enjoyed my time.”

“Third and fourth stage, especially the latter with the mountaintop finish on Vallter 2000,” Contador pointed out to most decisive stages of Volta a Catalunya.

“But it is going to be a very open affair with bonus seconds to be taken every day, there are no flat stages and a lot of aggressive moves from the peloton are expected,” he explained Biciciclismo.

Even though a lack of the individual time trial in the Catalan race works in Contador’s favor as he intends to compete with Froome for the final victory in the event, the Spaniard acknowledges that it is something he cannot avoid if he takes his Tour de France ambitions seriously.

“You never know. When you opposes a pure climber it can be beneficial, other times, when you fight against a strong time trialist, not so. At the end you have to stick to the course, it is what it is and you have to adapt.”

The Tinkoff-Saxo roster has undergone some last-minute alterations after it turned out that Rafał Majka still hasn’t fully recovered from his crash in Paris-Nice. Young Polish climber, usually a strong support to Contador, has been replaced by Jesper Hansen but Spaniard remains confident about his team for the upcoming event.

“We have a young team, but full of excitement and I’m sure they will cooperate perfectly,” he concluded.