Prospect enhanced for Welsford in stage one win

Nothing matches the anticipation of the start of a new season, whatever your sport.

As the 2025 UCI World Tour season got underway at the Tour Down Under in Adelaide’s east, that nervous anticipation was rippling throughout the crowds lining the road, ripples that would roll all the way from Prospect to Gumeracha, the first salvo of this year’s race.

Australian Sam Welsford crossed the line first in a frantic bunch sprint into Gumeracha, backing up his win at the pre-tour criterium and the faith of his team to claim the first ochre leaders jersey of this year’s race.

“Sam’s had a really good winter,” Welsford’s exhausted teammate Ryan Mullen told ABC Sport at the finish line.

“He’s super motivated, he’s working really hard … we’re keeping our feet grounded, he’s putting in a lot of work, he deserves that win.”

Prior to the stage getting underway, the lean and chiselled riders of the professional peloton milled around the staging area in a state somewhere between relaxation and apprehension in the picturesque and appropriately-named City of Prospect.

The pre-race process, be it enjoying a coffee, pinning on their numbers, adjusting the socks or simply completing a brain teaser, was in full flow.

Everyone on the start-line has different goals in mind, both this week and for 2025 as a whole.

Pre-stage favourite Welsford won three stages at last year’s Tour Down Under but the road was never going to be his focus as he sought an elusive Olympic gold medal on the boards of Paris.

That is a goal he achieved. Pressure off.

Now the tarmac is calling. First stop, a stage win at the Tour Down Under.

“[There’s] A lot of pressure on the shoulders as [we’re] probably one of the strongest sprint teams here,” Welsford told ABC Sport in the start area, encased in an ice vest as the temperature began to push into the 30s.

“Pressure comes, and I’m pretty used to it now … it kinda gives me a bit of extra motivation, that belief the team have [in me].”

That links to the next goal, to secure a contract for next season, with his two year deal at Red Bull-BORA-hansgrohe over at the end of 2025.

“I really wanna make sure I can prove to the team and give them back after they allowed me to do track last year.”

The first part of his mission is already accomplished.

Now, with a new trainer to help harness the latent power in Welsford’s legs from the track and build the engine to thrive on the road, the 29-year-old can push on and make himself invaluable to a team brimming with talent.

“We had a lot of eyes on us today, we had our backs up against the wall,” Welsford told media at the finish.

“Nobody wanted to help us out there today but we kinda expected that and we went out there and kept the break in check.

“Really happy with the team, we are really relieved, a lot of pressure coming in from last year so really happy to get the first win on the board.”

Welsford almost messed his return to the professional peloton up.

Having sprinted so long from so far out, the Australian raised his arm to celebrate just as second-place finisher Matthew Brennan sped towards him beside the barrier, a half-wheel behind.

“I had someone on my wheel and I was keeping them in check and I didn’t really notice the left, I should have bloody been closer to the left I think,” Welsford said.

“I should have realised that it was a really fast downhill sprint at the end and they come really fast from the back, I thought I had it but he came with such pace that I … I thought my front wheel was over the line but then he came zooming past me and I was like, hmmm, maybe I mucked that up.

“I was happy to get it in the end.”

Luke Plapp had different prospects in mind as he cut a relaxed figure at the start line.

“Just get the first stage out of the way,” Plapp told ABC Sport after carefully affixing his race radio to his jersey outside his team campervan.

“Especially as it’s a sprint. It’s not for me.

“Get through safely, kick off the World Tour season and then look towards the rest of the week.”

Plapp’s goal is for overall glory.

With stages three, four and five on his call sheet, this is a day to turn the legs over and acclimatise himself to the professional peloton.

“I’m sure there will be a few nerves out there,” he said.

“Hopefully we can just get through unscathed, have a nice easy day in the saddle in the beautiful sun and get ready to race later in the week.”

Unscathed was the plan. It’s not quite how it worked out.

Despite minding his own business at the back of the peloton, Plapp was caught up in a late crash that saw teammate Luke Durbridge graze his new national champions jersey.

Jay Vine, his wife Bre looking on with baby Harrison asleep in a carrier on her chest, has similar overall ambitions for the race — and for a safe day in the saddle on day one.

“It’s probably more nerves now because it’s been a week of build up, you don’t really do that even for a grand tour,” Vine said.

“It’s anticipation to get this thing started.

“But I’m also really excited to get the season started as well.”

Nothing about the first day of racing was easy.

With 2,386m of climbing, a breakaway fancied its chances immediately and three men broke away from the off, local boy Zach Marriage and his teammate Fergus Browning, with Decathlon AG2R La Mondiale’s Bastien Tronchon the third wheel as they summitted the spectacular Gorge Road to Kangaroo Creek Reservoir together, their gap growing to almost five minutes.

“I train on these roads every day,” Marriage told ABC Sport at the finish.

“It’s pretty special to hear your name on the side of the road at your home race.”

The scenery in this part of South Australia is almost poetic in its beauty, burnt-green grasses under the fluttering gumtree leaves, the baked rocks poking through a cliche of Australiana.

A blink-and-you’ll-miss-it glimpse of a kangaroo silhouette among the trees simply completes the fantasy vista, as strings of white cloud stretch across the pale blue sky.

Frenchman Tronchon soon dropped back to leave the two Aussies to their lonely, ill-fated escapade.

The gap did blow out to as much as five minutes as Red Bull-BORA-hansgrohe — through the solo efforts of Filip Maciejuk on the front — waited for support from the rest of the peloton to start the chase in earnest, which came with around 60km to go.

By the time the peloton came through Gumeracha the penultimate time, that five-minute gap was under two minutes, the close inevitable.

Summitting the final climb up Berry Hill a minute ahead of the peloton, former Australian under 23 road champion Browning secured the king of the mountains jersey, the 21-year-old putting himself firmly in the shop window after the collapse of Trinity Racing prompted his return to Australian domestic racing.

“I put a lot of eggs, mainly into the Tour Down Under,” Browning said at the finish.

“It’s obviously so special to get the start with the Australian national team and probably what I’ve been training for the majority of the summer in Australia, to start it off like this is awesome.”

He said the “major goal” was to make a return to Europe but admitted that everything was “a bit up in the air at the moment”.

“I got a bit unlucky last year with Trinity folding,” he said.

“It’s a bit annoying not having a contract over there yet, but all things going well I would really like to get back over.”

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