Up until late January, it seemed like nothing could stop Luke Plapp from having a first shot at the overall classification of a Grand Tour in the Giro d’Italia this May.
Having secured the time trial title at the Australian Championships for a third time and also instrumental in propelling his Jayco-AIUIa teammate Luke Durbridge to the road title just a few days later, the 24-year-old continued with a solid performance in the Tour Down Under, taking sixth overall.
But then some much-needed surgery on a lingering hand injury forced the Jayco-AlUla rider to rethink his goals radically for much of the first half of the season. His spring program was drastically reduced, and although there was a morale-boosting stage win in the low-profile Tour of Hellas mid-April, a return to WorldTour racing only took place in the Tour de Romandie a couple of weeks back.
As a result, Plapp told Cyclingnews pre-Giro d’Italia, that while the third Grand Tour participation of his career – and his second Giro – was never in question, he no longer had the option of having a crack at the Giro overall and seeing where it got him.
Instead, as he said, he’s coming into the Giro d’Italia with the idea of riding himself into top shape for the second half of the race, and going for stage wins instead.
“The year started awesome, but then I had a lot of days off after surgery, I missed a lot of race days in Europe, and a lot of days that were planned to happen like UAE, Paris-Nice and the likes of that,” he said.
“So I’m quite fresh coming into the Giro in terms of race days, but training’s been going well up to now, and I’ve been building every single day.
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“I’m interested to see how the first week goes and how I feel on the bike, and hopefully I’ll be able to do well in the second half of the Giro and in the second TT.”
Sure enough, as the Giro tackled the Cat.3 Surrel climb late on for a first time on Friday, Plapp could be seen hovering at the rear of the pack, still holding on but not forcing the pace. Then the second time round, as Lidl-Trek upped the pace to increasingly fraught levels, Plapp dropped back, finally losing 5:35 by the line
Team officials were untroubled by his time loss at the finish, saying that he would be focused on the days and weeks to come. Although the first 13.7 kilometre time trial in Tirana could feel like a natural objective, Plapp told Cyclingnews pre-Giro he’s got more interest in how he’ll perform in Tuscany on the much longer TT challenge of stage 10.
“Saturday’s TT is not one that suits me massively, or a distance I love,” he said.
“I’m definitely focusing more on the second one, I’ve been training towards it a bit, knowing how Romandie went, and how my training’s been. So I’ll build into the race and get better rather than try and be red hot in the first week.”
While the dust has yet to settle in Jayco-AIUIa on general manager Matt White’s shock exit from the team on Wednesday afternoon pre-Giro, Plapp politely but firmly declined to comment on the news.
However, he is clearly focused on his upcoming Giro d’Italia goals, a race where he held the Best Young Rider’s jersey in the 2024 edition, and which he says is more an inspiration than a realistic repeat goal for 2025.
“With [Juan] Ayuso (UAE Team Emirates) here, it makes it a lot more challenging,” Plapp said.
“It’s not something I have earmarked as a big task, but I did leave last year’s Giro with three top fives and a seventh on stages in there.”
“If I can be around that mark and fighting for some stages this year, that’s what I want to be doing, and if I can capitalise on one of those days and turn it into a stage win, that’d be awesome.”
Never one to beat around the bush, Plapp described his return to WorldTour racing at Romandie, where he finished 72nd, as “a massive shock to the system.”
“It’s May now, and I hadn’t done a WorldTour race since Down Under, which was obviously a very different WT race in itself.
“But it was something I think I really needed, and I’m really grateful I did it going into the Giro because I think if I hadn’t done it, the first few days would have been quite tough.”
The question of skipping the Giro altogether was never on the cards, though, he says, even if he had to change his goals so considerably. As he puts it, quite apart from what he can do in the race itself, last year completing the Giro pushed his overall level up considerably, and this year he could perhaps reap the benefits from May in longer-term goals like the Worlds TT.
First, though, comes the Giro d’Italia, where Plapp says that the very different scenario on offer in 2025, compared to Tadej Pogačar’s domination of 2024, will likely help him in his goals of a stage win.
“I think the GC battle is going to be very tight this year. [Juan] Ayuso has shown some red-hot dominant form this year, but I think the way [Primož] Roglič and the [Adam and Simon] Yates brothers ride, too, they’re not going to try and win six stages and the GC [like Pogačar] anyway.”
“So rather than Pog’s saying I want to win this, this and this stage, in terms of breakaways it will be a lot more open and hopefully this time they can stay away.” And in the process, hopefully, Plapp can reap some major benefits, too.
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