Orica-GreenEDGE rider Michael Matthews writes that he’s ready for his Tour de France debut

I MUST admit because I didn’t really start cycling until my late teens, I didn’t know much about the Tour de France was until I was 17.

Matthews: ‘I’m primed for Tour debut’

IT’S been a big year for young Australian cyclist Michael Matthews. In May he won two stages and wore the leader’s pink jersey in the Giro d’Italia and on Saturday he will make his Tour de France debut with Australian team Orica-GreenEDGE. Today, the 23-year-old from Canberra writes the first of his exclusive columns in the lead up to the biggest race of his career.

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I MUST admit because I didn’t really start cycling until my late teens, I didn’t know much about the Tour de France was until I was 17.

I grew up racing motocross but once I started cycling the first real race I heard of was the Tour and to think that I’ll be on the start line on Saturday is pretty scary, really.

It was my goal from the start of the year to make the team for the Tour and with the form I’ve got going in, it’s nice to know that I could make a difference instead of going there just to finish.

It’s every cyclist’s dream to ride the Tour de France and once you work so hard to get selected, you’ve really got to step it up to another level to be able to do something in the race.

Everyone is there with 110 per cent their best form and there are 200 guys wanting to make a difference in the race. So making the team is the first step, the second step is doing something in the race.

I don’t really know the date when the team told me I was racing, but after the Giro d’Italia they said I was in the long squad and from there I did the training I needed to do as if I would be racing in July.

My preparation has been a bit different to the other guys in the team and not your typical Criterium du Dauphine or Tour de Suisse lead-up.

I rode the Dauphine last year but back then the Tour de France was never really on the radar. I still hadn’t even done a Grand Tour yet so I think for a first time it’s best to do a Giro or Vuelta a Espana which are still big races but aren’t the pinnacle of the year for a lot of riders.

It was nice to get the Vuelta done last year and pick up some stage wins and after the Giro this year, it’s all been pretty much spot on in terms of preparation.

My coach Brian Stephens, my fiancee Katrina and I have been travelling around doing lots of training camps and putting our heads together on how we can mix up our training.

After the Giro I did three weeks of training at altitude leading into the Tour of Slovenia last week, while a lot of my teammates had been racing either the Dauphine or Suisse.

I didn’t have good racing legs but I had good power and it was nice to win the time trial. I didn’t go to Slovenia expecting to do anything but obviously my form came up a bit faster than I thought and I was top three in the stages I contested.

So coming out of that it was nice to have one day of rest then get back into it with a lot of hard training with Brian in Monaco. He flew from Austria to do the final preparations for the Tour and all I really needed was a lot of motorpacing to get that extra top-end speed, which I was missing in Slovenia.

I fly out of Monaco on Tuesday afternoon and head to the UK where the Tour starts on Saturday, but leading into that I’ll still be training pretty hard because you can’t start resting from Tuesday.

We’ll do a fair bit of course recon of the first few stages then Friday we’ll have a recovery day and start racing on Saturday.

Katrina is coming to the start of the Tour and will be there every rest day and is also coming to Paris, and her family is coming to Paris from Slovakia.

My family is also coming to Paris from Australia. It’s always nice to have your family see you finish a race so that will be a bit more motivation for me to get there, for sure.

Originally published as Orica-GreenEDGE rider Michael Matthews writes that he’s ready for his Tour de France debut