On and off the bike, a year of major changes beckons for Australian cycling star Richie Porte.
But the No.1 objective stays the same -- realise his potential at the Tour de France.
While disappointed not to successfully defend his Tour Down Under title in Adelaide, the Tasmanian is upbeat and says 2018 could be his best season yet.
The biggest change in his life will come in May, when he and wife Gemma become parents for the first time.
He has also changed his race schedule before the July Tour de France significantly.
Porte will not race at Paris-Nice, which he has won twice, and go to Tirreno-Adriatico in Italy instead as an early-season European stage race.
Impending fatherhood means Porte will bypass the Criterium Dauphine in France and race at the Tour of Switzerland.
"It's quite exciting, I've never done the Tour de Suisse," he said.
"I'm looking forward to getting back to Europe and really getting the season started."
Porte is also relishing the addition of compatriot Simon Gerrans to the BMC team.
He personally made an approach last year when it looked like Gerrans was on the verge of retirement.
Gerrans showed his value at the Tour Down Under as their road captain.
"If I look at it from the point of view of having guys like Simon Gerrans, with all that experience, it's an area (where) we've lacked in the past," he said.
"So that's pretty exciting.
"I'm super-motivated for this year -- I was last year as well -- but this year everything is looking up."
On Saturday, Porte won the Willunga stage for the fifth year in a row.
It showed emphatically that he has recovered from his horrific crash at last year's Tour de France.
But winning at Willunga was not quite enough for Porte to become the first rider to win successive Tour Down Under titles.
South African Daryl Impey finished second at Willunga and tied for the overall with Porte.
A countback of stage results gave Impey the race lead and on Sunday the Mitchelton-Scott rider won the race for the first time.
"It would have been nice to win again, but my team did all we could ... we went down swinging yesterday," Porte said.
He will race at next Sunday's Cadel Evans Great Ocean Road race in Geelong before returning to Europe.
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