‘There could be a massive drop-off’ – Jay Vine warns of dramatically narrowing pathways to professionalism for Australian and New Zealanders

Few Australian racers have been as successful in the past five years as newly crowned National Time Trial Champion Jay Vine – and that’s despite some massive setbacks along the way. What’s more, arguably even fewer have had such an unorthodox pathway into the highest levels of the sport as Vine did.

The story of Vine turning pro at Alpecin in 2021 as a reward for standout success at the Zwift Academy e-racing, rather than on real roads, has been recounted many times now.

However, as Vine told Cyclingnews this December before heading to Australia for the Nationals and a crack at a second title in the Tour Down Under, when it comes to other pros from his homeland now trying to make it in Europe by much more conventional career pathways, the UAE Team Emirates-XRG rider is increasingly pessimistic about their prospects.

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What Vine believes to be a below-par racing scene in Australia, rising costs across the board, and on top of that, the increasing focus by professional teams on finding young talent all combine to mean the window of opportunities are shrinking fast for his compatriots, Vine says. And that goes for both men’s and women’s cycling.

In fact, Vine even goes so far as to say that the current prospects in the women’s side of the sport are akin to the tough struggle that Australian and NZ men faced over thirty years ago to turn pro and succeed – an era when the number of male professionals from those countries in the European peloton could be almost counted on the fingers of one hand.

But across the board, in any case, Vine’s description of the challenges for young Australian and NZ amateur racers looking to progress further up the ranks as “cost-prohibitive” is hardly encouraging.

What’s more, that economic challenge, as Vine sees it, is only one of the major obstacles compared to some years ago. In an era when riders like teammate Tadej Pogačar are winning the Tour de France aged 21, or Juan Ayuso (Lidl-Trek) makes it onto the podium of the Vuelta a España aged 20, the trend of searching for ever-younger racers seems unstoppable. That trend is not benefiting Australian cycling at all, he says.

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“For the current generation [of Australian racers], for sure it’s harder because you’ve got to be in Europe doing races at 15, and you know, you’re still at school, all that sort of stuff,” Vine told Cyclingnews last month.

“I hadn’t even ridden a bike at 15, but [nowadays] you’ve gotta be exposed to racing at 15.

As for the rising costs, “Back then, also, you used to be able to just pick up a bike that was, you know, 1500 bucks, ride, and get a good result. Now it’s – you’ve gotta have a bunch of equipment. Bikes are more and more expensive, and that’s also the case with flights, accommodation, and all that sort of stuff.

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“I think it’s very cost-prohibitive to try and get into the sport,” particularly, he added, when in a far-flung nation.

Nor is it only when it comes to individuals, Vine says. He believes local teams, too, are likely finding it harder and harder financially to get off the ground.

“I mean, starting your own team, like – who did it? Drapac, a Pro Continental team” [An Australian squad finally merged with EF in 2016, while it continued as a development team for some years after – Ed.] “or what was the other one, Black Spoke in New Zealand? [which ran from 2021-2024-Ed].

“It’s just so cost-prohibitive. It’s nice, but it’s so expensive to run in this European sport. So I don’t think that’d be wise.”

“You need to be in Europe to do it. I’ve tried to support a couple of women to come over to Europe in some Continental teams, but you’ve got to be in Europe, and you’ve got to be in Europe early.”

He is equally gloomy, if not more, about the prospects for women’s racers, even though budgets have been on the rise in recent years, and that is across the board.

“I think women’s cycling is probably where men’s cycling was in the 90s. And to try and get a 21-year-old from Australia into a Continental team or a ProConti team, as I see it is, like, almost impossible.

“Unless you’re [up-and-coming British cycling star] Cat Ferguson…or unless you’ve got a European connection, it’s really difficult. Or [unless] you’re incredibly talented and you just win everything.”

Race action in Australia (Image credit: Getty Images)A deep-rooted problem?

Nor, Vine believes, is it as simple as getting to Europe and starting to race, as he can testify himself. To rewind to April 2021, Vine made an immediate impact on his pro debut at the Tour of Turkey, finishing second on the Elmali summit finish. Later that year, he would catch the eye of many cycling fans again at Lagunas de Neila during the Vuelta a Burgos. Put it all together, and it meant that riding fast uphill was never the problem for him.

Rather, back then, as Vine told Cyclingnews in an interview in 2023, if he had faced a steep learning curve when he turned pro with Alpecin, his strength-sapping lack of race craft at the time could in part be attributed to apparently chronic deficiencies in the racing scene back home.

“In Australia, in a bunch of say 60 guys max, there’s really only five guys who are on the verge of turning pro, and they can do whatever they want in the bunch, they can go from last wheel to first, no problem. It’s like putting [Fabian] Cancellara in a junior race, he can do whatever he wants,” he said in 2023.

“Then you come over here, and you have 70 Cancellaras, so you can’t just do whatever you want. You’ve got to work the race tactically and use your teammates. Riding in the bunch without using massive amounts of energy, that’s the biggest thing. I knew I had a lot to learn.”

Fast forward five years and Vine has obviously moved on enormously – witness his steadily improving palmares in specialities as varied as double success in the Australian National time trial title and then snapping up four mountain stages of the Vuelta a España – and counting.

But to judge from Vine’s words, the lower level of racing compared to Europe remains endemic to the Australian peloton. On top of that, there’s been a drop-off in interest in Australia, he says, in organising racing as well, which you could argue makes a vicious circle even more of a closed one, too.

“It’s getting harder and harder for clubs to put on races, especially when there’s not that groundswell of riders wanting to do it,” Vine says.

“So when I was racing amateurs in my local club” – in the latter part of the last decade – “there was a core group of five to ten guys. But that A-grade sort of half of it moved into Masters and got older, and families and all that sort of stuff, and then half of them racked it, and then that next wave of cycling riders are still 12 to 15, so they haven’t gotten into that group yet.”

“I think Cycling Australia’s trying to resurrect the support for the under-19s and under-23s. But I mean, we’re signing people that are under 19 now into the WorldTour, so you sort of need to start when they’re 12. Unfortunately.”

Furthermore, as a pro of over five years standing in Europe, he’s also not overly convinced of the idea that the criteriums raced in Australia – one of the most resilient sides of the sport as they minimise the costs and difficulty of getting approvals and traffic management – can really contribute overly to a rider’s progress on the other side of the globe. Equally worryingly, he believes is that the number of races across his country is dropping across the board, too.

“Even in my local region, I know a bunch of state handicaps have sort of stopped running because the people that run them have moved on, and they haven’t been taken up by other people to continue running them. The crit scene seems to be still pretty popular, but you know, for someone wanting to go professional in Europe, crits are almost worthless.

“A lot of the racing in Australia is actually pretty ordinary for European stuff, so it’s disappointing. I think trying to get to Europe as quickly as possible is the best way of doing it.”

On the plus side, once a rider is established, like Vine, the benefits are anything but minor, he says, given the way wages have risen considerably over the last few years, particularly in the biggest teams.

As he puts it, “I’d also swing it the other way in that the reward’s a lot better as well, right? I mean, there’s not much money in cycling, but the money in cycling has gone up. You know, there’s lots of pressure on young riders, but we’re also being paid professionally now.”

2024 Olympic Games elite women time trial: Grace Brown speeds to gold (Image credit: Getty Images)A massive drop-off – and a solution?