The Saxo Bank team, which will be known as Saxo Bank-SunGard, will undergo an almost complete transformation in 2011 with most of its biggest names leaving for pastures new. Australian Richie Porte, who burst on to the scene last year in his first season in the ProTour, is one who is staying on; in an interview with procycling.no, the 25-year-old Australian insists that the Danish team will still be one to be reckoned with next year.
“We will have a strong team,” he said. “We don’t have as many stars as in 2010, but many riders are going to take more responsibility. That includes riders such as Gustav Erik Larsson, Chris Anker Sørensen, Baden Cooke and myself.”
Porte’s first ever year at cycling’s top level was less than three months old when he took his first ever ProTour victory: the individual time trial victory in the Tour de Romandie at the end of April. It was in May’s Giro d’Italia though, that the World was forced to sit up and take notice of the young Aussie though as he wore the leader’s pink jersey for three days, before swapping it for the green mountains one. He held on to the maglia verde all the way to the finish in Verona, where he ended the race in seventh overall.
A comparitively quiet summer was followed by fourth place in both the Eneco Tour and the Tour of Britain, before taking another fourth place in the World Championship time trial in his native Australia.
Results like these would not disgrace the season of a much more experienced rider, let alone one in his first year at the top. After such a year Porte has to decide how to approach 2011, and how he can fit his own ambitions around his other teammates; particularly Tour de France champion Alberto Contador, who currently awaits his fae after testing positive for a trace amount of clenbuterol at the race.
“I have the ability to ride the Tour,” he said confidently, “but it depends on whether Contador will be acquitted, or how long he’ll be suspended.
“I like the Giro course too,” he added, “so it may be that I’ll be asking to do that again too. It is certainly not appropriate to try to do Giro-Tour; Giro-Vuelta is probably much smarter.”
Despite his achievements in 2010, and his obvious ambition to achieve more, the 25-year old is still aware of his tender years and relative lack of racing at the top level.
“Although I’ll quickly get more responsibility next year, it will be another year of learning as the main focus,” he conceded.
One of Porte’s biggest results of the year, and one of the most disappointing, was his fourth place in the Worlds time trial. To come so close to the medals and the podium on the champonships first visit to his country, just 7 seconds behind bronze medallist Tony Martin, was initially agonising for him; he has since come to terms with the result though.
“At the time I was very disappointed because I was so close to the podium,” he admitted. “Now that I've gotten a little distance on the race though, it's good to be number four; I have worked for many years to improve my time trialling. Also, I realised that the bronze winner Tony Martin punctured, and when he was actually pat way up the climb.”
In all, despite his initial disappointment, Porte’s Worlds experience was a positive one.
“It was fun to ride the World Championships on home soil,” he said. “The sport is growing at home in Australia, and it was fantastic with so many spectators around the course.”
Saxo Bank-SunGard’s first training camp begins this Sunday (28th) but in a departure from previous years, team manager Bjarne Riis will not be subjecting his riders to the notorious survival camp.