Wednesday 29 November 2017 17:08, UK
Team Sky have confirmed Chris Froome will participate in the 2018 Giro d'Italia.
Froome will take part in the Giro for the first time since 2010 and victory would mean him holding all three grand tour titles at the same time, a feat only previously achieved by Eddy Merckx and Bernard Hinault.
The 32-year-old has won four of the last five editions of the Tour de France and he followed up his 2017 success by claiming victory in the Vuelta a Espana for the first time.
He has only ridden the Giro on two occasions, finishing 36th in 2009 when part of the Barloworld team and then being disqualified from the 2010 edition for taking a tow from a motorbike during one of the final stages.
Froome is also likely to attempt to become the first rider since the late Marco Pantani in 1998 to win the Giro and Tour de France in the same season - no rider has ever won all three.
"It's a unique situation for me, having won the Tour and Vuelta and now having the opportunity to go to the Giro and attempt to win a third consecutive Grand Tour," Froome said.
"It's really exciting to be able to take on a new challenge, to do something that perhaps people wouldn't expect and to mix it up.
"It's a whole new motivation for me to see if I can pull off something special next year.
"I feel as if my cycling career started in Italy in some ways. I lived there for three years when I began my career as a professional, so having the opportunity to go back to the Giro in the position I am now in, and with the opportunity I have, feels in some ways like completing a circle."
He is likely to face some very stiff competition in the Giro, with home favourites Fabio Aru and Vincenzo Nibali scheduled to take on defending champion Tom Dumoulin.
Next year's race begins with three stages in Israel, the first an individual time trial in Jerusalem, while there is another test against the clock in the final week which would benefit Froome and world time-trial champion Dumoulin.
Dumoulin, who rides for Team Sunweb, overturned a 53-second deficit on Nairo Quintana on the final time trial to win last year's Giro with Nibali back in third.
