Alberto Contador gunning for Tour de France win after Giro victory

UTRECHT, Netherlands - Tour de France contender Alberto Contador’s serious-looking face cracked into a beaming smile during a lighthearted moment at his pre-race news conference on Thursday, when he was joined by an unexpected guest.

It happened when two Dutch television journalists presented the Spanish rider with a canary in a cage, popping it down on the table right next to him.

Contador used to breed canaries when he was younger, something he says he no longer has time to do since becoming a professional rider, and he sat gazing curiously at the tiny yellow bird as it hopped around.

Yellow will be all Contador has on his mind from this Saturday onward as he tries to win back the famed jersey he officially won twice before, in 2007 and 2009.

The showcase race starts with an individual time trial around the Dutch city of Utrecht and ends July 26 in Paris.

Contador’s 2010 Tour title was stripped from him after a failed doping test for the fat-burning, muscle-building drug clenbuterol, and his 2011 Giro d’Italia title subsequently also scrapped. Following a suspension, Contador looked well set for a podium finish at the 2013 Tour, only to slump late in the race and finish fourth.

His frustration turned to agony on the 2014 Tour, when he dropped out on stage 10 after a bone-breaking downhill crash during a mountain stage. Remarkably, he continued to ride for 20 minutes with a fractured left tibia - and with blood gushing from his right knee - before agony overwhelmed him.

Contador, dejected, ruled himself out of the 2015 Spanish Vuelta only to recover more quickly than expected, change his mind and win the race for the third time.

He has another objective now: the Giro-Tour double.

“If I win just another Tour it’s not going to change my career, but if I achieve the double this is something people are going to remember,” Contador said Thursday.

After winning his second Giro title in May, he now has the chance to become the first rider since Italian Marco Pantani in 1998 to complete that double the same year. He has thought about nothing else since the Giro ended.

“I sacrificed everything. Every day, every minute I have been working toward this,” Contador said. “There was no celebration. I put absolute focus on the bike. It’s a new challenge for me.”

A hugely ambitious one, given the strength of the opposition. Barring his way are defending champ Vincenzo Nibali and 2013 winner Chris Froome, who also has a burning desire to win after crashing out on the cobblestones in last year’s Tour. Colombian climbing specialist Nairo Quintana, runner-up to Froome in 2013, is also a threat.

“I have been training and resting. But I think I’m well recovered physically and also mentally, which is probably more important,” Contador said. “There are four favorites everybody talks about but I think there are more riders … (Romain) Bardet, (Alejandro) Valverde, (Thibault) Pinot.”

While Nibali’s Astana team and Froome’s Team Sky have changed their lineups since the Giro, Contador’s Tinkoff-Saxo team has retained five riders from that race.

Contador will be nervous, however.

This year’s opening nine-day swing from the Low Countries across northern France again features the dreaded cobblestones. Rain and slippery stones are a nightmare for most riders, while some like Nibali glide over them with dismissive ease.

“The first objective is to try and avoid crashes. It’s a very complicated start to the Tour,” Contador said. “The first nine days there are at least six very intense stages, maybe more. It’s going to be a Tour with no rest.”

Contador felt in better condition heading into last year’s Tour.

“If I had to choose between last year and this year’s feeling I’d take last year’s,” he said. “I come here with a clear objective. I know it’s very difficult.”