Cycling: Dean back for another Tour of duty

Julian Dean (centre, in orange) became the best performed New Zealander in the Tour de France with his three podium finishes last year. Photo / Photosport

Julian Dean is a little pensive about this year's Tour de France - and he has every reason to be.

The world's greatest cycling event is acknowledged as tough and often dangerous. Countless riders withdraw with broken bones and beaten minds as they succumb to the gruelling 3500km course but few have had to endure as much as Dean.

In 2009, he and Spain's Oscar Freire were shot by an air rifle at the top of a climb. Examinations after the race found a pellet in his hand.

Last year, he was headbutted by fellow competitor Mark Renshaw as they jostled for position in the finishing sprint - Renshaw was later thrown out of the race - and then tackled off his bike by an over-zealous gendarme who mistook him for an errant spectator as he warmed up for the 16th stage.

"That's the Tour de France," Dean says phlegmatically.

"It's a major event with huge global exposure. It always seems to attract crazy things like that. Everyone is a little bit excited. Those things are going to happen a bit more ... it just seems to happen more to me.

"I'm not sure [what's going to happen this year]. I will be pretty vigilant about things to make sure it's nothing too serious."

Nothing, it seems, puts Dean off his stride. The 35-year-old is widely acknowledged as one of the toughest in the peleton - he was the only rider in 2009 to finish all three grand tours of France, Italy and Spain and last year he rode the world championships in Australia without realising he had a shoulder fracture - as well as the best lead-out rider in the world.

He got a taste of life on the podium at last year's Tour de France, with two seconds and a third, but it's not his job to finish at the front of the field. He's employed to put his team's sprinter in place to win and he's the best in the world at it.

Dean's Tour de France podium finishes are the best by a New Zealander (the previous best was one) but it wasn't enough to earn a nomination as a finalist for Halberg Sportsman of the Year when the shortlist was announced yesterday.

It's a ludicrous decision but is not one Dean will lose sleep over. He didn't feel 2010 was any better than other years anyway.

"Non-cycling people might regard it as my best year ever," he says. "In terms of results, it probably is, but I don't really think any of my performances were better than other years.

"My condition and race form was just as good [as previously]. It was just the circumstances, with [Garmin's No 1 sprinter] Tyler Farrar breaking his wrist [early in the Tour de France].

"It meant I could do my own sprints in the Tour. It allowed me to get three podium finishes."

Regardless, he still had to be good enough to finish at the head of the pack. He was second on the fourth stage despite crashing heavily two days previously and found himself on the podium twice in three days later in the race.

"It was a big mental change for me, more than anything, because I had to go from thinking about putting another rider into position with 200m to go to starting to think again like a race winner, which is quite different," he says. "For someone of my character, it's not that easy.

"I'm one of the older, more experienced guys now and I'm quite a calm and collected athlete. I don't really show a lot of aggression. I'm always the guy willing to put myself on the line for other people.

"Sometimes I wonder [what I might have achieved had I been a team's No 1 sprinter]. You always think about that. But I found a niche and something I was very good at. Throughout the years, there has been no one better than me at it. I have always been proud of that. To find your niche in any field and be so successful at it for so many years is quite something.

"It's not a role everyone is comfortable with - especially top level athletes who are driven and born to succeed. People like me are a little unique and really valued by team directors."

His team chiefs have some thinking to do about how they attack 2011. Dean's Garmin Transition have merged with Cervélo TestTeam to create Garmin-Cervélo, which means two-time Tour de France green jersey winner (for the best overall sprinter) Thor Hushovd could be battling with Farrar to be the team's No 1 sprinter.

"There are a lot of changes in the wind," Dean says. "It's going to be a little bit difficult. It's going to take time to get the gist of things and get everyone working together again.

"In one regard, it's been tough for us because we started four years ago as a small team. We have been building the team around Tyler, which I have really enjoyed. Suddenly now it's all been turned upside down. We have an incredibly strong team on paper, it's just a matter of making it work.

"The difficulty will be when Thor and Tyler have similar goals, like winning the green jersey at the Tour de France.

"How that's going to be managed could be a little bit tricky. That's not my decision. My job is to implement whatever the plan is."

How long he continues to do that is something he's wrestling with. Dean turns 36 this month and realises he's closer to the end than the beginning. There have been countless times he's wanted to quit, many while he pedals his larger sprinter's body over high mountain passes as the lighter climbers dance ahead. But he hasn't. Quitting isn't his style.

"One of the big things is I am not going to be able to live this life forever," he says. "I am very privileged. I'm at the age now that, once I stop, I stop. There will be no comeback.

"For me, as hard as it is sometimes, I want to make the most of the opportunities.

"I take it year by year. I have a contract through to the end of this year so I will follow through with that. I would like to keep going for a little bit more but it only really takes one serious crash or injury. At my age, it can quickly change your pattern of thought. It depends on the family as well."

They will soon pack up and head back to their base in Spain but before that, he will compete in this month's Tour Down Under as well as next weekend's national championships.

A quality field has been attracted to the 187km race in Christchurch, highlighting the strength of New Zealand cycling, and Dean will line up alongside the likes of Hayden Roulston, Greg Henderson, Sam Bewley, Jack Bauer and Jesse Sergent. Unlike most events, however, riders are in it for themselves. Only Team Subway and Pure Black Racing have entered teams, with everyone else riding on their own.

Dean has been training every day - he can't afford not to as his years advance - but isn't in top condition as he prioritises the European season. He's won the national title twice before and last year cramped in the final sprint to narrowly finish behind Bauer and Roulston.

"The start of the season is always a struggle for me," Deans says. "It always seems to take me a couple of months to get going, so the Tour de France is the big objective."

What awaits him there is anyone's guess.