DAVID MILLAR is out to grab the spotlight from fellow-Brit Mark Cavendish when the Tour de France starts in Monaco on Saturday.

DAVID MILLAR is out to grab the spotlight from fellow-Brit Mark Cavendish when the Tour de France starts in Monaco on Saturday.

Millar, the 32-year-old Scot, is about to embark on his eighth Tour. He has worn all four Tour jerseys - yellow for race leader, green (points), polka dot (King of the Mountains) and white (best young rider) - and is bullish about his prospects this year.

He said: "I've a feeling I'm going to be 100%, which will give me a real shot at it."

He fractured his collarbone in a crash in the Paris-Nice "race to the sun" in March, which made him reschedule his season.

He entered the Giro d'Italia, withdrawing after 15 stages, before ending ninth in the Dauphine Libere - a Tour de France tune-up - early last month.

"It the Giro was the last thing I wanted at the beginning of the year but breaking my collarbone threw things up in the air," he said.

"But breaking my collarbone is a blessing in disguise. I missed some key racing, but it's allowed me to focus my energies on the Tour de France.

"Now I'm back in control of everything. It's worked out well."

Millar is likely to sacrifice personal goals for Garmin-Slipstream team leader Christian Vande Velde, who was fourth in the 2008 Tour.

But the opening prologue is a chance for him to clinch a first stage win at cycling's premier event since 2002.

"It's one of the bigger targets," said Millar, "but you can't go all out on the first day, you've got to think of the other 24 days."

One of the reasons for Millar's barren run in the Tour is due to a problem which has again blighted the build-up to the event - drugs.

He confessed to the use of blood-doping agent EPO and served a two-year ban until 2006.

Race organisers have barred some riders this year, while Alejandro Valverde is subject to an Italian Olympic Committee ban.