{"id":416555,"date":"2026-02-09T18:09:10","date_gmt":"2026-02-09T18:09:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/416555\/"},"modified":"2026-02-09T18:09:10","modified_gmt":"2026-02-09T18:09:10","slug":"even-as-the-dog-grows-old-its-sense-of-smell-never-fades-nairo-quintana-still-ambitious-for-podiums-and-victories-after-turning-36","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/416555\/","title":{"rendered":"‘Even as the dog grows old, its sense of smell never fades’ \u2013 Nairo Quintana still ambitious for podiums and victories after turning 36"},"content":{"rendered":"

Nairo Quintana<\/a> came close to his first race victory in four years at the Tour of Oman<\/a> on Monday, attacking on the final climb of stage 3 only to be caught just 300 metres from the finish line.<\/p>\n

The Colombian veteran is at the start of his third season with Movistar and now lies in the top 10 of the GC with the final stage, the 6km, 10% challenge of Green Mountain, lying ahead.<\/p>\n

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He lies 30 seconds off stage winner and new race leader Mauro Schmid (Jayco-AlUla), while Movistar<\/a> teammate Diego Pescador is fifth, 17 seconds off the lead.<\/p>\n

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Speaking to AS<\/a> on Sunday, Quintana said that his aim this week is to help his younger teammate while beginning the build-up to his own 2026 goals.<\/p>\n

“Try to always be at the front with Diego Pescador to try to win the overall with him,” Quintana said, before adding he’d like to race the Vuelta a Espa\u00f1a this year.<\/p>\n

“I hope to be able to participate in some of them,” he said of the Grand Tours.<\/p>\n

“I really like the Vuelta a Espa\u00f1a<\/a>; it’s a great stage, and I’ve always done well in the summer, but if I have to go to the Giro d’Italia, that’s fine too.<\/p>\n

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“We hope to do well in all three Grand Tours, and in the Tour de France this year, we’ll have the great contribution of Cian Uijtdebroeks<\/a>, which is a huge motivation to have a teammate up front in the general classification.”<\/p>\n

Quintana, who turned 36 last week, said that his own ambition is to make it onto the final podium of a race this year.<\/p>\n

His 11th place on stage 3’s race up Eastern Mountain was his best result since sixth place at the Vuelta a Murcia a year ago. He last stood on a podium when he finished second on stage 15 of the 2024 Giro d’Italia.<\/p>\n

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“To be on the podium in a race. To win,” Quintana said of his ambition for 2026. “The instinct is there, and even as the dog grows old, its sense of smell never fades.<\/p>\n

“I feel young again, thanks to all the teammates who fill me with energy and happiness on the bike, and that happiness would be even greater if I could be on a podium.”<\/p>\n

He’s also looking forward to helping younger teammates progress and succeed, too.<\/p>\n

“We’ve had great moments, some truly great times, winning races that lasted three weeks, one week… and now we have a very good group that continues to grow, and it remains to be seen how far they can go.<\/p>\n

“The team’s objective must be to win big races again. Little by little, our riders are establishing themselves: Iv\u00e1n Romeo<\/a>, Carlos Canal, and now Diego Pescador taking his first steps… we have to think about the future, but also about the near future.”<\/p>\n

As for Quintana’s own future, well, surely retirement is on the cards in the coming years. He’s been a pro racer for a decade and a half, but isn’t confirming a date just yet.<\/p>\n

“We keep adding up the years… and the experience is already gained. It’s time to realise that there’s not much time left and start thinking about other things too,” he said.<\/p>\n

“We’ll see how the season goes and decide what to do, but for now I feel good, with good sensations, and I hope I’m lucky enough to avoid injuries.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Nairo Quintana came close to his first race victory in four years at the Tour of Oman on…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":416556,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[37],"tags":[4985,101,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-416555","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-cycling","tag-cycling","tag-sports","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/416555","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=416555"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/416555\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/416556"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=416555"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=416555"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=416555"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}