He was as soon as touted as some of the promising up-and-coming racers in biking. But as an alternative, Ukraine allrounder Mark Padun, the winner of two Criterium du Dauphiné mountain levels in 2021, has opted to finish his profession at 28.
The choice was seemingly not taken abruptly. Padun’s final season, 2024, barely noticed him in aggressive motion, abandoning the three stage races he took half in, then ending outdoors the time restrict within the workforce time trial of the Tour of Slovakia in mid-June. After that, he didn’t race once more.
The Ukrainian has not made any public indication on social media concerning what plans he now has after terminating his short-lived profession, though he has household hyperlinks to each Andorra and Italy, the place he raced as a U23 rider, in addition to his residence nation.
A professional since 2017 who claimed his first victory on a stage of the Tour of the Alps in 2018, Padun turned well-known to many followers after his spectacular summer time of 2021.
That was when he surprisingly claimed back-to-back Alpine levels of the Critérium du Dauphiné, in addition to the mountains classification, forward of a few of the largest Tour de France favourites. Despite not subsequently being picked for the Tour, Padun adopted that up with third total within the Vuelta a Burgos and concluded his breakthrough season with some blistering workforce domestique performances within the final week of the Vuelta a España for Bahrain Victorious GC chief Jack Haig, who ultimately completed third total.
Padun signed a two-year cope with EF Education in 2022, however regardless of preliminary optimism from supervisor Jonathan Vaughters that he might information the Ukrainian in the direction of a extra steady sequence of performances, Padun stop the American WorldTour squad on the finish of 2023.
“I first seen him there too [in the Dauphiné] and the way in which he received was extremely dominant,” Vaughters instructed Cyclingnews on the time of signing Padun. , additionally saying that Padun’s “gross VO2 Max was a lot greater than something I’ve encountered in my profession as a supervisor or rider.
“Our head of sports activities science, Peter Schep, fashions out each stage [in advance], particularly days the place we intend to attempt to put guys within the breakaway, to attempt to decide if you may make it to the end and, say, how a lot time you want on the backside of a final climb to win.
“So the very first thing I knew about Mark Padun was Peter calls me and says ‘God, this man’s completely screwed up my mathematical fashions. They don’t apply any extra as a result of he went so quick up the hills.
“I began following him after that, dug into his junior and U23 years as a rider and located a fairly fascinating character. He was a superb junior and received fairly a number of races at U23. He was very near successful the World Championships in that class forward of [Tadej] Pogačar.
“But he was additionally very inconsistent and that carried on into his professional years. He’s not capable of maintain it collectively all yr lengthy. So it piqued my curiosity.”
Suspicions had inevitably surrounded Padun following his sudden stand up the biking hierarchy in the summertime of 2021. But Vaughters, having appeared intimately at his organic passport and carried out different checks, instructed Cyclingnews in 2022 that he felt they have been unjustified.
Padun definitely bought off to a really promising begin at EF, with a victory – his final of 5 in his profession – in O Gran Camiño in February and a 3rd place on the rostrum alongside riders of the calibre of Alejandro Valverde and Mike Woods.
However, the inconsistency Vaughters had wished to iron out, principally via correcting Padun’s erratic vitamin schedules, didn’t disappear: So after a really uneven 2023, Padun moved down a stage to ProTeam Corratec-Vini Fantini.
However, after one other yr, 2024, during which Padun did not reignite his profession, this December he formally moved out of the game utterly.
