Laura Stigger stunned the cycling world when she won the junior women's road race world title on home soil in Innsbruck, Australia in 2018. Six years later, she has built a successful career in professional mountain biking but she is ready to return to road racing having signed a new deal with one of the biggest teams in the world, SD Worx-Protime, for the 2025 season.
"It was super special to immediately take the world title in my own region at my first real introduction to the road. I am now curious to see what I am worth in the elite category on the road," Stigger said in a team press release.
"It's nice that I can discover that while I can still continue my mountain bike career with the Specialized Factory Racing Team."
Stigger had a successful multi-discipline junior career where she also won two world titles in cross-country mountain biking and a gold medal at the European Championships in 2017 and 2018. She went on to win three under-23 mountain bike World Cups and the series ranking in 2019.
Since moving up to the elite ranks in 2020, although she was still under 23, she has secured multiple victories and podium finishes in the World Cup series in cross-country and short track racing.
Stigger, 24, currently races with Specialized Factory Racing, and she will continue competing in cross-country mountain biking. She will also race select road races including the Ardennes Classics, with SD Worx-Protime, also sponsored by Specialized.
"Laura will combine mountain biking with road cycling. We are pleased that she will do this with us. With Laura, we have another nice reinforcement for climbing. She will do well in Ardennes work. Last year she attended a training camp with our team and it went very well. That's why we took the decision to give her the chance to get a taste of the real thing on the road," said team manager Danny Stam.
"The combinations of different disciplines is more and more a trend. Mountain biking and road cycling are quite complementary. Mountain bikers are usually quite strong in the mountains and can release their power well there."
Stigger believes that her strengths are in punchier road races but that she needs to build her experience. She said that training on home roads in Innsbruck meant that she was well-suited to climbing in that area, which was why she placed a focus on the road Worlds six years ago.
"That succeeded and I also ended up winning the world title in my home city. Totally unexpected. A wonderful memory," Stigger said.
She said she subsequently met Anna van der Breggen, who had won the elite women's road race in Innsbruck that year, at an altitude camp and then spent some time training together. She said Van der Breggen, who will come out of retirement and race with SD Worx-Protime in 2025, encouraged her to compete on the road.
"The fact that it has finally happened a few years [later] is beautiful and exciting at the same time. I look forward to now riding alongside her in the same team," Stigger said.
"I think my steering skills from mountain biking will come in handy. I hope to make important strides in both road cycling and mountain biking by combining both disciplines."
