Jay Vine’s year just keeps getting better. At the start of January he flew to victory at the Australian National Championships' time trial in his first attempt, and now he steps into the ochre leader’s jersey at the Santos Tour Down Under in his debut at the Australian WorldTour, lining up with new squad UAE Team Emirates.
”Some of the greatest Australian cyclists have worn the jersey and one of my favourite riders, Richie Porte, you know he has won this race twice. It’s pretty special to be able to put the jersey on and hopefully take it home on Sunday night,” Vine said in response to a question from well-known cycling commentator, Matthew Keenan, for the race broadcast.
If the start of 2023 is any indication of what is to come, he could well get rather used to speaking with him over the coming months and years.
Vine’s career trajectory just keeps getting steeper. From being cloistered away in Australia during the COVID-19 pandemic – which shut borders and severely limited the opportunities for hopeful professional cyclists – he managed to get a professional contract through the Zwift Academy with the team that was then Alpecin-Fenix. That initial contract of a year was extended, but Vine made an early exit to join UAE Team Emirates in 2023, a move that looks to be paying off as he sits in the lead of the Tour Down Under.
“I love it when a plan comes together,” said Vine, making a reference to an oft-used line from 'The A-Team', a former action-adventure television series. ”But I couldn’t have done that without the team though. All I had to do was go on the last hill; they helped me all day and full credit to them they did an amazing job.”
The Corkscrew climb on stage 3 of the Tour Down Under, with the ascent topping out just 5.8km from the end of the 116km day of racing, was always expected to be pivotal for the GC. Vine had started the day in second, just three seconds back from race leader Rohan Dennis (Jumbo-Visma). This was always a climb expected to play to the UAE Team Emirates rider's strength. Even Dennis said, "it’s much more a Jay Vine climb than a Rohan Dennis climb.”
Dennis was right. He suffered a mechanical that set him back, ochre disappeared for the South Australian and came into view for Vine. He went on the attack with Simon Yates (Jayco AlUla) and then Pello Bilbao (Bahrain Victorious) as well.
“I had no time gaps or anything, our radios didn’t quite reach over the top of the Corkscrew climb, so it was just full gas to the finish," said Vine. "I’d seen it quite a few times when the race has finished downhill into Campbelltown that big groups can come back and there was a massive group behind us, so it was just push all the way to the line to make sure we can get a a lot of time buffer because anything can happen in bike racing.”
Vine ended up third on the stage behind Bilbao and Yates, but the work he had done through the days of racing meant he was now 15 and 16 seconds ahead of his two top rivals, Yates and Bilbao, respectively. The best of the rest was white jersey wearer Magnus Sheffield (Ineos Grenadiers) with a gap of 45 seconds. While Vine carved out a buffer, it was not big enough for Vine to get comfortable.
“If they gave me another three more Corkscrew's it would have been fine but there’s a lot of road between here and Sunday evening so I’m going to definitely be conservative,” said Vine.
What’s ahead on Saturday is a 133.2km stage from Port Willunga to Willunga township that is expected to be a day for the sprinters, while Sunday’s short but sharp finale of 112.5km will tackle Mount Lofty five times.
“Anything can come from anywhere in this race,” said Vine.
”You can have bad luck in the last 5kms and not get back in time. Lofty is also a really, really, hard stage where if they play it like a classic it could be a really tough day so I’m not counting any chickens before they’ve hatched that’s for sure.”
