If you happen to’ve adopted biking over the previous few years, you will nearly actually know the identify Lukas Pöstlberger. He is a Giro d’Italia stage winner, a two-time Austrian highway champion, and he wore the yellow jersey on the Critérium du Dauphiné for 4 days in 2021. Now, aged 32, he finds himself in a decent spot.
With out a crew, Pöstlberger is racing the Tour of the Alps this week for his nationwide squad. It is simply his second highway race of the season, his first this yr at professional stage, and the stakes are excessive. efficiency, he feels, will assist him get again into the professional ranks, a tier from which he fell on the finish of final yr.
“There was a bit little bit of a miscommunication with [Jayco AlUla] final yr,” he informed Biking Weekly forward of the primary stage. After seven years at Bora-Hansgrohe, Pöstlberger joined the Australian squad in 2023, the place he stayed for only one yr, earlier than he acquired “neglected”.
“My administration and their administration have a distinct strategy of doing issues,” he stated. “I actually needed to remain, after which I acquired neglected. I do not need to blame anyone particular, nevertheless it performed a component that some Australians needed to return again to the crew and be aggressive there. There was a spot to fill after they left me out, and a few native guys had the advantage of it.”
“I attempted to get in contact with different groups, however on the finish of September, it is actually exhausting to get something going. I needed to discover a totally different resolution and check out myself as a privateer, perhaps bridge a yr and get again to the WorldTour subsequent yr.”
(Picture credit score: Getty Photographs)
On the Tour of the Alps, Pöstlberger does not have the luxurious of a luxurious crew bus. He is travelling from stage to stage within the Austrian squad’s white minivan, and racing on a blue Lapierre bike, the fruits of a private take care of the model.
This season, although, he is gotten extra used to using with flat handlebars. “I needed to change to mountain bike,” he stated, a sport he hadn’t carried out since he was 11 years outdated. “It is a lot simpler to get into a tough race in mountain bike these days. It has been a little bit of an journey I’d say, nevertheless it’s good preparation.
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“It is a totally different strategy when you must do all of the organisation and the supporting and the planning for your self, additionally to be aggressive and attain the extent the others are at. They’ve much more racing of their legs, however this perhaps performs in my favour.”
At this time, due to his quiet race schedule, Pöstlberger feels contemporary and able to show himself. He pressured his approach into the breakaway on stage two of the Tour of the Alps, the place he stayed for over 160km, using on dwelling roads into Austria, earlier than dropping again to the peloton.
“Ultimately, I could not maintain the wheel,” he stated on the end, brief for phrases below the Alpine solar. “I attempted however I wasn’t profitable.”
Nonetheless, what the Austrian’s transfer did present was a dogged dedication, the identical angle that helped him by way of the winter, and the identical one he hopes will land him a contract for 2025.
“I am already speaking to groups,” he stated, earlier than including: “There’s nothing concrete. It is a exhausting enterprise and a tricky job. I hope my expertise will assist me get in contact and keep in biking.”
With a transparent mission at hand, Pöstlberger’s again on the radar.
