Luke Plapp’s main assignment at this Giro d’Italia was to learn, and that directive hasn’t changed despite Jayco-Alula’s loss of team leader Eddie Dunbar to a crash on the road to Oropa on stage 2.
Dunbar, 7th a year ago, had entered this Giro as a podium contender, while Plapp, in only his second Grand Tour appearance, was handed the freedom to gauge his limits in a three-week race. His status hasn’t been upgraded to that of GC leader despite Dunbar’s misfortune.
“It's still day by day for me, it doesn’t change anything,” Plapp told Cyclingnews. “Eddie was our GC guy, and I was just taking the race as it comes.”
The early auguries for Plapp weren’t all that promising. The Australian champion, like several others, struggled with the intensity of the high-octane start to the race in Turin, and he conceded almost a minute when he was distanced over the Colle Maddalena on the opening day.
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General manager Brent Copeland reckoned that Plapp had been caught out by the days of downtime in Turin before the Giro got underway. The rider himself could only agree with that assessment.
“I just think the week off between Romandie and the Giro, where I did nothing, cost me on the first stage,” said Plapp, who had the consolation of being able to put things to rights on the climb to Oropa 24 hours later. “I felt more myself there. I was about where I thought I’d be. The gap to the front group wasn’t that big to be honest, it was only a few seconds.”
The 23-year-old restricted his deficit to Pogačar on the climb to just 1:20, and he was closer again to Geraint Thomas et al. Above all, he was heartened by how he managed the ascent. He had the nous to follow his own tempo on the upper reaches of the climb, reaching the summit in the company of Domenico Pozzovivo and Romain Bardet.
“We spoke about it with [Mat] Hayman and my support crew, and basically every mountain stage is a time trial for me,” said Plapp, currently 21st overall, 2:33 behind Pogačar. “The idea is that I ride my power from bottom to top and not even care about what they do in the race. So as soon as [Rafal] Majka started to ride on Sunday, I was happy to go my own speed and I think you saw I limited my losses really well towards the end, even though I rode the last 6k with just me and Pozzovivo.”
That ascent to Oropa is the template Plapp will aim to replicate every time the road climbs at this Giro. Rather than risk exhausting his resources by straining to stay in the same rarefied orbit as Pogačar, Plapp will dole out his effort in a way that matches his current abilities.
“That will be the approach on every single climb – just do my power,” Plapp said. “I come from a time trialling background, and I know my watts, so I won’t get carried up in that race and hopefully that stops me from having a really bad day or blowing up.”
Vuelta
Plapp laughed when asked if his previous Grand Tour outing at the 2022 Vuelta a España had given him any indication as to how his condition might hold up across the three weeks of this Giro. Back then, after all, the Commonwealth Games had been the focus of his summer, and he was thrust into the race by Ineos with little in the way of specific preparation.
“I learned not to do three weeks of team pursuit track work for the Comm Games before a Grand Tour,” Plapp said. “That cost me at the Vuelta, because I went in there heavy, I went in there with a track focus. I’ve prepared a lot differently for this, I’ve spent seven weeks at altitude already this year, so I’m looking forward to how that helps in the third week.”
At Paris-Nice in March, Plapp showcased his potential as a stage race rider, spending two days in the yellow jersey before placing 6th overall on the Promenade des Anglais. He insisted, however, that results in the here and now are not the be-all and end-all of his Giro, even if he is among the favourites for Friday’s time trial to Perugia.
“It’s not about GC for me here, but it is about practicing for the future,” Plapp said. “That means trying to treat every day like a GC day, whether that’s going hard in the time trial or going through the climbing days without sitting up before the finish line. The main thing is that I just don’t want to have a bad day.
“Hopefully by Rome I’ll have a much better idea of how to tackle a Grand Tour. I learned nothing from the Vuelta in terms of that, so this is the first one where I’ve really been trying to practice the processes of being a GC rider, but without the pressure of getting a result. I don’t want to over-attack any stage. I’d just like to limit my losses every day and practice riding over three weeks.”
