INTERVIEW: LUKE DURBRIDGE
Mitchelton-Scott’s Durbridge on how he’s learning to conquer the cobbles
You crashed in the Australian nationals and broke your collarbone, but you’re back racing at Omloop Het Nieuwsblad. Was the recovery a straightforward process?
We just needed to give the body some time. I lost a lot of skin, had some stitches in my knee but I was back on the home trainer after a week off.
On the eve of the Classics season, how do you feel?
On the ‘opening weekend’ you always feel a bit anxious about how the off season’s gone. I think it’s the first race that really matters to the Classics riders. If we’re talking proper races, this is the one you get a bit of a feeling for. There’s still Tirreno and the actual big Classics to come, so it’s an opportunity to race this type of race in bit of a less stressful environment. It’s a good opportunity to test where my form is at.
And in terms of form, where do you want to be given the majority of Classics are still a few weeks away?
You want to be coming into your form in the coming weeks and I would say that 90 per cent of the best Classics guys are doing the same. You can’t train like you’ll race tomorrow. The guys that will race the final tomorrow will still be missing a few per cent from how hard they’ll race in the future. I’m using tomorrow to race as deep in the final as I can.
How difficult is it to master these races, particularly as an Australian with limited exposure to the these roads when you were coming through the ranks?
One: you have to love it. It’s a whole different kettle of fish in terms of riding. I always loved the Classics growing up and my first race in Europe was the Three Days of Panne. So if that’s not enough of a scarring and you come back after that, then you must love it! But back then I was missing a lot. I was missing a lot of experience, I was really inefficient in the bunch and I was riding out in the wind, just because I didn’t like to be in the crap and all the dangerous bits.
The older guys, Mat Hayman and Mitch Docker [Hayman is a team-mate at Mitchelton-Scott, while Docker switched teams over the winter and now rides for EF Education First-Drapac], said if you want to do it properly this is how you do it, and now the last three years I’ve rented a house in Ghent for a month. I will come back after Tirreno and I’ll spend a month here in total. I have a coach here and we motor-pace between the rest days. It’s a thing I had to do because
“I was always a bit conservative, thinking about when was the ‘ perfect moment’ to go. But there’s no perfect moment in these races; that’s why we love them”
I know I’m already behind the eight ball against the other guys who know the roads. I need to educate myself each year.
Last year seemed like a bridge had been crossed - you were fourth at Dwars door Vlaanderen and E3, among some strong results. What made the difference?
It was just a year where everything clicked. It was like I felt I needed to step up. I thought if I really wanted to do well in these races, I needed to do something different. And I think what I did different last year, from my first race, was I went early. Before, I was always a little bit conservative and thinking about when was the ‘perfect moment’ to go. I never really went on intuition. But there’s no perfect moment in these races; that’s why we love them. If you feel the moment’s right and everyone’s under pressure, just go. Look what Gilbert did in Flanders last year, he went at a moment when people thought, this is absolutely ridiculous, and look what happened.
Another thing was if I found myself out of position I would find someone that I knew had to be in position and use them to get back. I would look around more and check out who was there. If it was Van Avermet, Sagan or whoever, I made sure I was with them. It was establishing the opposition and using them, but also being like, ‘F*ck it, just go.’
After a couple of frustrating years did you feel pushed towards the point where you just felt you had to try something totally different?
I think so, yeah. You get pushed to that point. But also people try something new and then want an instant feedback or reaction. I think with cycling, you can put in all this training for one event and you might not do well in it, but down the line you’re winning all these things that you never expected. For me it was like that a little bit. I was a little bit frustrated, but there was no major pressure from the team or anyone, it was more that I just wanted to try something, go for it and see what happened.
Do you feel like you’ve got the measure of the Flemish races?
I think you’ll always be learning. It’s easy to say I want to win Flanders or whatever, but if you haven’t been in the top 10 in any of these races how can you say that? You have to see the finals consistently to know what happens. What happened last year was that I saw a consistent amount of finals. I wasn’t on the podium in any of them, but I saw them unfold; how the race was won in those final moments. When you’re in that group behind racing for 20th or whatever you never know what the other guys are doing.
Are you a more rounded rider these days? When you turned pro your reputation was as a strong TT rider.
I’ve definitely become a more rounded rider, but TTs are still a priority. When I came onto the scene I was a time triallist but realised that I could also be quite good in the Classics, so I was trying to develop that as well. They go hand in hand. When I was in good form in the Classics I won the TT at De Panne last year, so I think the efforts put in for the Classics complement the TT.
And when you think about it, throughout the season we’re doing less and less TTs these days. If you look at the year now, I might do five in total in the year, and one of them might be two and a half weeks into a grand tour – so how are you meant to do a good TT when you might have been riding on the front? So my time trial might look like it’s slipping away a little bit because those Classics are coming up, but that’s just because you race 10 times the amount of Classics.
You said last year after E3 that you struggle to hold the wheel of punchier riders on steep hills. Have you tried to remedy this?
We’ve worked a bit on that but I feel that it’s never going to be my bread and butter. We’ve worked out a way that it’s okay to let those guys go, but it has to be my four-minute power that makes sure I can get back on. I’ve worked hard on those one to two-minute powers, but I’m never going to be able to go up the Cauberg like Philippe Gilbert. I think it’s about working out how to use my strengths. What I would like is to not get gapped so much. In E3 last year I rode over the Kwaremont and then chased for 30kms by myself and ran fourth. If I don’t lose a wheel by so much, then I come back, I’ve got 30km to play with.
Matteo Trentin arrived with a lot of experience from Quick-Step this year. How does the team see you working together in the Classics?
Matteo had that role at Quick Step as the guy who had to move early because there was Gilbert or Boonen waiting back to do the final. I think Matteo in his own right is a final rider, he’s a guy who should move on the last climb with the best guys. But he’s either had to ride on the front or put guys in a good position for the final climb. It’s something he did really well and he got good results from it, so you can see how good he is. Here, he deserves to be one of the final guys. I feel that my role, because the type of rider I am, is to move early. I’m not as punchy on the final climb; if I wait to the final climb, I’m not going to be able to go with those guys because they are too punchy. My ability is to go in front, then they come to me, we’re even because they’re tired from coming over.
And what about Roubaix? It’s been a tough taskmaster for you.
I think that’s the Classic that suits me the best and I’ve not had the best luck. Last year when Niki Terpstra’s fork broke he took me out and we both ended up in the ambulance. Like the other Classics it takes time. Learning the route is something that takes a while. As a team, we used to fly home after Flanders and then come in for a Friday recon, but now the whole team stays. We do a recon on the Wednesday, a proper recon on the Friday. We’ve learned a hell of a lot from Mat [Hayman, 2016 winner]. It’s one of those races in which you have to wait to blossom. We are doing the background effort to be better at that race though.