Coming off his best-ever performance at the Tour de France and a return to Ineos Grenadiers (formerly Team Sky), the 36-year-old has not raced since January's Tour Down Under.

The Tasmanian will be hoping a summer spent training around Launceston will pay dividends as he embarks on the eight-day race starting Sunday.

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"I can't really say what my ambitions are for this edition of Paris-Nice," Porte said.

"I've just arrived from Australia and even in normal conditions, it's already an extremely complicated race to win.

"This time, I just don't know what sort of form I'll be in ... I've only raced in January in Australia, whereas my rivals have already taken part in very competitive races in Europe."

Porte has five stage wins at Paris-Nice to go with general classification successes in 2013 and 2015, which both came during his time at Sky.

This time he will team up with Australian time trial star Rohan Dennis and last year's Giro d'Italia winner Tao Geoghegan Hart.

"Paris-Nice is not an easy race to win, so to have won it twice is gratifying," he said.

"It's a special race for me. Because I live in Monaco, I mainly train on the roads around Nice.

"So, I'll have the feeling of racing at home towards the end of the week."