Kaden Hopkins is heading into the Tour of Guadeloupe, a multiple stage road bicycle race, determined to make his mark.

The Bermudian top cyclist, who competes for French team Vendée U, won two stages in the ten-stage race last year. Racing starts today and concludes on September 1.

“I’m feeling really motivated for the Tour of Guadeloupe this year,’’ Hopkins told The Royal Gazette. “I had a lot of success last year, both individually and with my team.

“I’m excited, I feel good coming into the race. I just finished two weeks at an altitude camp, so I’ve had a good block of training coming into this.

“I feel like I am close to my best level, I’m really looking forward to starting this race, and seeing how it goes.

“If I could win another stage or two stages again this year, it would be great. Those are my main objectives for the tour.”

Because of the prolonged nature of the race, the 24-year-old knows how difficult is it for riders to achieve the fastest cumulative time across all stages.

“Its ten days so it’s quite a long race,” he said. “Because of that, it’s hard to stay in the general classification, but each day I’ll fight to be in the front, and try to have as much success as possible.”

“The morale in the team is really good, it’s a new place for a lot of these guys. It’s their first time racing in the Caribbean, so everyone is really excited and the team will try to repeat the success of last year.

“We’ll try and win as many stages as possible, keep one or two guys in the overall for the end of the race.”