Four months ago, back in the middle of the cycling summer, Ben O’Connor abandoned the Tour de France just as the race hit the Alps, suffering from a torn glute muscle.
The injury, sustained in a crash early in the race and worsening as the stages passed, wrecked the big goal of the Australian’s 2022 season, a year on from his impressive fourth place overall.
O’Connor, AG2R Citroën‘s GC leader, fought on to the second rest day before pulling out, the withdrawal a disappointing conclusion to what had been a successful campaign during the spring and early summer. With seventh, sixth, five and third overall at Andalucía, Catalunya, Romandie and the Dauphiné, all had looked set for another top-five fight in France.
Despite the disappointment, the 26-year-old from Western Australia believes he took another step up this year.
“I think it was really good. I can’t fault the season, really,” O’Connor told Cyclingnews at the recent Rouleur Live event in London.
“I think I did everything I could have for it to be a good season. I was top 10 in pretty much every single race I did. That’s already quite a good achievement.
“Although at the Vuelta I was expecting more. I really wanted to be in the top five. I just wasn’t good enough at the time. I tried the GC way and I just couldn’t reach that peak like I had done earlier in the year at the Dauphiné and heading into the Tour.
“I’m happy with it. I can only say that I wish I was more aggressive at one or two races like at the Tour of Romandie. Otherwise, I think I took my chances pretty well. Got two wins in the year, which is good.”
O’Connor’s wins came at Catalunya and Tour de Jura one-day race, but it’s his progression in stage race GC results that stands out. Now, he said, he feels he is a name among the top contenders, rather than a rider who gets mentioned in passing as a challenger on the fringes of the top 10.
“You have to remember that last year it was only Romandie, Dauphiné and the Tour that I was in the top 10,” he said. “Romandie [2021] was my first top 10 in a WorldTour stage race and now I can do it in every WorldTour stage race. So, I think that shows that I’ve kind of made it.
“Even in a race I DNFed like Paris-Nice with whatever that nasty bird flu was that was going around, I was in the front echelons and I’m proud of that. Even if I didn’t get the result in the end, those days were actually a success because you braved it out and actually learned a new skill really.”
After the Tour DNF,…
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