Zubeldia set for Tour-Vuelta double

Haimar Zubeldia will once again embark on a season brimming with big races. The reliable 34-year-old will, as has become the norm, take on both the Tour de France and the Vuelta a España for his team RadioShack - Nissan Trek in 2012, and will do most of his other racing in Spain, BiciCiclismo reports.

Like pretty much every other Spaniard in the peloton, Zubeldia will kick off his season at the Challenge Mallorca in early February. He'll then head on to the Vuelta a Andalucía before testing his legs at the Volta a Catalunya, a race he placed third in three years ago. His home race, the Vuelta al País Vasco, then awaits, and in May he'll head over to the States for the Tour of California. Upon returning to Europe, he'll ramp it up for the Tour with the Dauphiné - scene of much success in his younger years at Euskaltel. He'll be one of the Schlecks' main domestiques in France in July, before likely getting the chance to step out of his helper role at the Clásica San Sebastián. He'll close out his season at the Vuelta in September.

Speaking of the merger between the 'Shack and Leopard, the former Euskaltel legend trusts team head Johan Bruyneel to make the riders click.

"It'll be vital to make these two 'groups' one. Johan is capable of doing that, and that was our aim in Spa. We were rivals last year, but this year we'll have to coexist. Normally we'd do our first training camp now, but, as this year's quite different, we spent a couple of days in Spa (before doing this camp in Calpe)", he told www.biciciclismo.com