HE WAS three years of age when his father Stephen won the Tour de France, and nine when he retired. Nicolas Roche doesn’t remember much of the hullabaloo, but he’ll experience the full majesty and madness of the event when things get underway in Monaco today, setting off on a three-week voyage of self-discovery that will reveal much about his potential in the sport.

Last September Roche junior showed a glimpse of the same stage racing talent that defined his father’s career. Heading to the Tour of Spain after a break-up with his girlfriend he was, according to his father, “mentally destroyed, but physically well. He wanted to just throw everything into cycling.”

That frustration boiled over into a swirl of aggression and determination. He had a superb race, finishing a close second on the stage to Las Rozas, and placing 13th overall in Madrid.

Since then, Roche has been competing with a new team, Ag2r La Mondiale, notching up a series of solid results. These include fourth and ninth on stages of the Tour of Catalonia and sixth on the second leg of the recent Dauphiné Libéré, although he appeared below par in the high mountains of the latter. His father does, however, expect things to go better in the Tour.

“I think he is better mentally than he was in Spain last year, but not physically,” he told the Irish Times this week.

“That said, he should be stronger than he was in the Dauphiné because he’s lost some weight. The first week has some very rolling roads as well, so he will ease himself into it.”

Roche got a boost when he won the Irish road race championships last weekend, beating An Post M Donnelly Grant Thornton Sean Kelly team-mates David O’Loughlin and Páidi O’Brien when he accelerated away inside the final three kilometres. He’ll wear the distinctive white and green national champion’s jersey for the next 12 months and his father believes this will motivate him.

“Having a new jersey on your shoulders is good. He’ll want to show it off and do it proud,” he said. “It can put pressure on you, as a national champion’s jersey is pretty unique in the peloton, it can mean you are automatically targeted a little bit.

“But I would expect him to finish the Tour winning a stage . . . he is a guy who gets into the good breaks.” In fact, he believes a top 20 place overall is possible, even if that would mean climbing at a very high level.

Roche junior has been a professional since 2005 and previously completed the 2007 Giro d’Italia and that Tour of Spain. Making his Tour de France debut at 25 years of age is the next step in his career, and one he hopes will bring increasing success.

“My personal ambition would be to go for stages,” he said, while also explaining he will have team duties to fulfil. “We have two riders for the general classification, Vladimir Efimkin and Cyril Dessel, and I will probably be working for them. But I will also try to go for breakaways and chase a stage win.”

Aiding that motivation is the fact the first two stages will be very familiar to him. The Tour will visit Monaco for the first time in 45 years, starting today with a 15km time trial which travels along part of the Formula 1 motor circuit. Roche spent much of his youth nearby, growing up on the other side of Nice.

“I lived eight years between Cannes and Monaco,” he said. “Sunday’s stage is basically on the same roads as my training ride, so it is pretty good.”