After capturing the Australian Road Race title yesterday, Heinrich Haussler is clearly in good form, perhaps the best he has been in for the last few seasons as he explained to CyclingTips and he is now hoping to win a race in his new jersey as early as next week’s Tour Down Under.

“I’m not saying now that I’m at my “best” but I was just talking to a few mates about that the other day. 2014 was the first year since 2009 where I’ve gone through a full season of good racing in my legs without having any bad crashes or an operation or breaking a bone or something. It makes a massive difference, getting back on the bike in the winter, getting ready, it just puts you on another level. And also, having a Grand Tour in your legs. So I’m really excited and I’m ready to go for this year and just see where it takes me.”

Haussler was quick to bat away the suggestion that winning at the Tour Down Under would be easy, saying people at home wrongly pin the race as easy.

“A lot of people underestimate the Tour Down Under. They think, you know, come out to Australia, first race of the year, the stages are only 140 km. But when I came in 2012, it was just as hard as the Pro Tour races in Europe. . . . It’s still absolute full gas. . . . There’s points up for grabs, they want to show the sponsors, the teams on TV, there’s no mucking around anymore. Everyone comes here 100%. But I’ll be ready to try and do something.”

He has already looked at the profiles and details four of the six stages which may present him with the chance to win a stage. The two hilltop finishes will be ignored by Haussler.

“Well there’s four stages where I could have a go. The other two, with Willunga and the new hilltop finish, they’re not for me. But we’re coming out with a really good team, a strong team. We’ve got a new climbing guy, [Jarlinson] Pantano. We’ll see how he goes, we’ll try to keep him up there on GC. But like I said, it’s hard racing. Even the second stage, in Stirling, what I saw last year, there were a lot of good hill climbers in the final and not so many sprinters left, but I think that could be a stage where I could have a go, I’ll just have to see what happens in the race.”

Haussler revealed he wouldn’t ride the Tour de France, where he took an epic stage win in 2009, as he is preparing solely for the Classics, where he has been second in both Milan-Sanremo and the Tour of Flanders, both in 2009.

“It’s just too much stress. I’d rather do the one-day races, and afterwards have a little bit of rest for the summer and build towards the next one-day races, Eneco Tour and Hamburg, Plouay, maybe the races in Canada and then build up again for the World Championships. If you do three times building up, it’s really hard to calculate and you’ve got to get things 100% so I’d rather do one big block, have a rest, do another big block of altitude maybe, and then get ready for the second part of the season. The thing is, if you come out of the Tour already cooked and really fatigued, you might still go to races but the season is already over.”

This is a big year for his IAM Cycling Team, with 2015 being their first year at the WorldTour level. He hopes team owner Michel Thetaz will remain on board to keep the team going in the right direction for future seasons.

“For the future, I hope Michel [Thétaz, team founder and General Manger] hangs around. I’ve never met a guy like him before, it’s amazing, there should be more guys like him in the sport. I have absolutely no worries about the team for this year. We’ve got a lot of good new riders, riders that are very solid, that can work hard, that can do their job. But also, especially for me, new guys for the Classics, like Jonas Van Genechten and Dries Devenyns. We already knew these guys before, I’ve seen them and how well they ride, and I’m absolutely really happy with the team. I think a lot of the people at the end of the season will wonder: where did IAM come from? Why were they so good this year?”

For Haussler, a successful season would see him return to his best level and be able to feature at the front of his beloved classics once again.

“In 2012 I had good racing again in the legs, and then in 2013 I was kind of back, I had top 10s again, in the Classics I could attack, I could actually do stuff and just have that feeling again, to be able to go on the cobbles, to have that sensation where you could stand up and attack. I want to get back to that. I want to have fun racing again. Sometimes it’s really frustrating, because you haven’t had the legs and you see the guys go up the road and you just think, “Fuck, what am I doing here? I can do this!” But I just didn’t have the form. But it’ll come. Just normal stuff, at the training camp, sitting around with your teammates, eating, laughing, joking, the spirit is just different this year. And that will reflect also on our results. It’s a bit of a family feeling. You have to have that, you have to be happy in your own environment. You know what I mean? If you are on a team and you’re not happy, sitting in a bus, guys next you and you don’t talk to them, obviously you’re not going to ride well because you don’t want to be there. I just want to get back to that level where I was, for example, in 2009 or 2013.”