Egan Bernal has been selected for the Ineos Grenadiers Tour de France and will return to Grand Tour racing for the first time since his life-threatening accident in 2022.

Bernal will miss next week's Grand Depart in Bilbao only due to a late illness or injury.

Tom Pidcock, Carlos Rodriguez, Daniel Martinez, Michał Kwiatkowski, and Jonathan Castroviejo are also expected to be named in the final eight for the British team along with Bernal, Omar Freire, Luke Rowe, Connor Swift, Honatan Narvaez, and Pavel Sivakov are among the candidates for the remaining two slots.

Filippo Ganna will miss the Tour de France, Tao Geoghegan Hart is still recovering from a broken hip sustained in the Giro d'Italia, and Geraint Thomas will lead the team at the Vuelta a España.

The Ineos Tour team will have a diverse lineup that will target stage wins, test Pidcock and Rodriguez's GC credentials, and help Bernal rediscover his Grand Tour ambitions.

The 26-year-old Colombian last raced a Grand Tour in 2021, finishing sixth overall in the Vuelta after winning the Giro that season. Bernal won the 2019 Tour, but suffered back pain in the 2020 race.

La Gazzetta dello Sport reported that Bernal will return to the Tour de France, and other evidence supports this news.

Bernal finished 12th overall at the Criterium du Dauphiné and has since been training hard in the hills of Monte Carlo. After Ineos Grenadier won the team prize on the final day of the Dauphiné and a place on the podium, he hinted that he would be competing in the Tour.

"I'm happy and excited to finish the Dauphiné, my first podium in a long time. Now the question is... What's next?" Bernal posted enigmatically on Instagram.

Bernal missed most of last season after being seriously injured in an accident in January 2022 when he crashed into a parked bus at 60 km/h. He recovered quickly from the injury but took a long time to fully recover, and the 2023 campaign was also marred by injury and bad luck.

He abandoned the Vuelta a San Juan with a knee injury and was forced to retire from the Volta a Catalunya after a fall on the final day. Bernal finished eighth overall in the Tour de Romandie and Tour de Hongri, but crashed heavily in the opening stage.

Despite all the setbacks, Bernal continues to believe in a successful comeback.

"There's something special about high mountain stages, isn't there?"

"It hurts, but once you get to the top of the climb, you realize everything you have done to reach that summit. It's not a number, it's a personality."