Esteban Chaves notes the biggest champions overcome the worst adversity.
It's how the Colombian cycling star is coping with harsh setbacks during last year, in a season that was supposed to confirm his arrival as a Grand Tour contender.
Instead, the 28-year-old was left mourning the sudden death of a close friend and also had to overcome two significant injuries.
The top rider at Australian team Mitchelton-Scott will return to racing on Sunday at the Cadel Evans Great Ocean Road Race.
Despite last year's woes, one of the most popular figures in professional cycling has not lost his trademark smile or his perspective.
"It was a really, really tough year," Chaves said.
"But it's like a circle, sometimes you're really up and sometimes you're really down.
"It's like this for everyone and when you're down, its when you see the real champion.
"If you look at the story of the the big champions, they have the biggest, hardest moments."
This time a year ago, the world was Chaves' oyster.
He was coming off a stellar 2016, which featured podium finishes at the Giro d'Italia and the Vuelta a Espana, and he was set for his Tour de France debut.
But a knee injury ruined his early season, meaning the Tour de France became less about results and more about experience.
Then a few days into the Tour, Chaves received the terrible news that his friend, Diana Casas Jimenez, died after a bike crash in Colombia.
Chaves finished the Tour and then the Vuelta, but his season ended abruptly in late September when he crashed at Italy's Giro dell'Emilia and suffered a shoulder fracture.
This year, Chaves will return to the race schedule that worked so well for him two years ago, racing the Giro d'Italia and the Vuelta rather than the Tour.
Chaves is unsure how he will perform in Sunday's 164km race from 11.10am, but the addition of another climb to the course will play to his strengths.
There is also no pressure on the Colombian, given Mitchelton-Scott are coming off a dream Tour Down Under.
Their South African workhorse Daryl Impey unexpectedly won the Tour title and he will be one of the favourites at Geelong.
