Ben O'Connor wants Tour de France podium in 2025: "That would be the dream"
Cycling
After the best year of his career to date in 2024, Ben O'Connor is making a fresh start in 2025 having swapped the Decathlon AG2R La Mondiale Team for Team Jayco AlUla. One thing that hasn't changed though, the Aussie's ambition to be amongst the very best in the peloton.
In 2024, O'Connor certainly was amongst the very best, finishing 4th at the Giro d'Italia, 2nd at the Vuelta a Espana and 2nd in the men's elite road race at the Zurich World Championships. That's not to say O'Connor is totally happy with how his year went though. “There were certain races where I definitely could have won. Like UAE, I blew it a little bit in how I raced the final climb. I was a bit fatigued in the Tour of the Alps and could have won that race if I’d freshened up a bit better beforehand,” he explains in conversation with Velo.
"At the Giro, I was crook in the final week. So really didn’t feel like I got the best out of myself," he continues. "Don’t get me wrong, I still had fantastic results with the Giro. I got two seconds and a fourth overall, but you can see very clearly that it could have even been better. You can say, ‘I know there was more there to take out of the year.’ Which is a good thing to be able to say, because it was unreal.”
O'Connor also isn't getting too far ahead of himself, noting how before he targets Grand Tour wins, he should first try to add more podiums to his palmares, having previously finished 4th at the Giro and the Tour de France. "I want to win a World Tour stage race. Actually, that’d be ideal. I’m not going to try and do too many leaps,” he explains. “For sure, you can see that if things align, it can work like with Tao Geoghegan Hart and Jai Hindley winning the Giro. It’s something you can envisage yourself also being in those footsteps. But everything has to align... I don’t want to bite off more than I can chew.”
In 2025 though, it seems the Tour de France is in the firing line of the 29-year-old. As he explains, standing on the final podium on the Champs Élysees is something dreams are made of. “Well, that would be the dream one year, one day. But who knows? In terms of reality, you end up as the best rider you are at the finish line in Paris," he assesses. “I talk about not getting ahead of myself, but it’s for sure something that would be on my mind one day. That would be sick in Paris. But it only happens to a couple people in their lifetime. So that’s my overall dream one day.”
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- Funny that they shorten women’s races but have no qualms about letting U23 do the same distances.Jumpyjohn23-03-2025
- Why is that relevant when discussing speed?Mistermaumau23-03-2025
- But he wasn’t the only one ;-)Mistermaumau23-03-2025
- Obviously the questions are more important to some here than to them or the team so I suggest looking for answers instead of asking questions between ourselves. We’ll probably get them unless someone actually goes to ask the protagonists themselves. Here are some starters : They like riding together; they have their own rivalry that helps bring out the best in both; they might get more points helping each other compared to racing separate races. In any case, unless we hear MJ complaining about it, I don’t think it’s going to change, it’s the Sepp Kuss syndrome all over again, fans lobbying against the will of the rider.Mistermaumau23-03-2025
- Mine goes to MVDP for entertaining us all year round :-) Stellar race, Ganna impressive in his own way as many predicted after some oddly lacklustre times.Mistermaumau23-03-2025
- i remember when not too long ago mathieu was regarded as a real tactical knucklehead. i’m not sure that was ever quite accurate, but it’s certainly the case that over the years he has become a real master tactician. in the biggest races, van der poel rarely makes choices that don’t fully optimize every specific advantage he has.OCexile23-03-2025
- Whatever the result, I believe the strategy by UAE to launch Pogacar was absolutely the right one. Unfortunately, they just were not able to execute it the way they must have planned, being all over the place at the start of the Cipressa.Cooldude23-03-2025
- They are without doubt not just the best two classics riders of this generation, but amongst the best of all time. MvdP is more suited to MSR and PR (which Pog has yet to race), while Pog is now almost untouchable at LBL and Lombardia. RVV is the only one where both basically have an equal chance to win.Cooldude23-03-2025
- bravissima!
maria2024202423-03-2025 - According to Tadej's Strava upload, he went up the Cipressa at an average speed of 37.6kph. Rocket ship! He did the 5.63km verified 'Cipressa' Strava segment in 8:59 minutes, which has a 4.3% average grade and total elevation gain of 229m. Naturally, he got the Strava KOM.Pogboom23-03-2025