Lukas Nerurkar assumes growing up in Ethiopia helped him in becoming cycling pro: "An altitude camp at the age of seven may have benefitted me"

Lukas Nerurkar might still a bit under the radar, but the 21-year-old already showed glimpses of great promise, gradually improving every year. And his story of becoming pro is no less interesting than his rider profile. Nerurkar, son of British Olympic distance runner Richard, grew up in high altitude of Ethiopia and now looking back, he believes it may be to his benefit now.

"I guess I did an altitude camp at the age of seven," he laughs about it in an interview with Rouleur. "I’m not sure of the exact effects of living there but I do feel like when I first go up to altitude now I’ve got a gain on other guys and it doesn’t take me as long to get acclimatised, so maybe that’s an underlying benefit."

Even though Nerurkar didn't smash the door upon entering the under-23 category with Trinity Racing, he never stopped to pursue his goal. "When I was at Trinity I had Tom Gloag a couple of years ahead of me and I saw how he dealt with going professional, so it became a realistic thing for me despite me not getting results in my first year under-23. I realised if I kept plugging away and I could still go professional in my third or fourth year, the options were open."

And it didn't take long for the break through result to come at the 2023 O Gran Camino when he came 6th in a WorldTour field lead by Jonas Vingegaard. "I was going well in training before Gran Camiño but I’d never translated that into a race before then. The first stage I did well, I was almost confused, then I had to figure out if it was a one time thing. When the race carried on like that, it set a new standard. Being on the podium at points with Vingegaard, that was pretty special, it was a pinch-me moment."

Afterwards, it didn't take long for the big-league teams to come knocking on Nerurkar's door: "EF was the team I really wanted to go to and I was happy with them after going on one of their training camps. I signed for them early before the Giro which took some of the pressure off for the rest of the season. They have a different approach. If you can perform straight away they will let you, and they will let you try a mix of races rather than putting you into one box. It’s not a copy and paste for every rider," Nerurkar says.

In his first year, the 21-year-old made himself be heard with fourth place at the Eschborn-Frankfurt, among others. "The options are still very open when it comes to what type of rider I am, in the future I think I’ll find out exactly what I’m good at. I find myself climbing well and being able to sprint off the back of it, but I can also do alright in high mountains. I think I can get better at that in years to come.”