Dubbo Cycle Club's Haylee Fuller riding for Australian National Team at the Tour Down Under

Haylee Fuller's start to 2023 has been action-packed and the Dubbo star will look to further increase her growing reputation at this month's Tour Down Under.

Fuller, who spent much of last year racing in Europe, will have the incredible chance to ride for the Australian National Team during the nine days of UCI WorldTour competition around Adelaide.

It's set to be another incredible experience for the 19-year-old, who is fresh off a bronze medal win at the Road National Championships at Ballarat.

"Being in the Aussie team is such an honour. No pressure," Fuller laughed.

"But it's going to be a fun week and it's going to be a good experience and a big opportunity."

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Fuller was speaking ahead of the first stage, which was on Sunday.

She's been a part of the Tour Down Under previously and it's expected to be raced at the most elite level this year given its the first event on the first event on the UCI WorldTour calendar.

"It's huge," Fuller said of the WorldTour.

"It's the highest level of racing you can get. It's pretty special."

As one of the younger riders across the entire Tour Down Under, Fuller views the competition as the perfect chance to continue her development.

Riding alongside professional cyclists each day will be another huge learning experience but she's also expected to do her job for the team as one of the domestiques.

The domestique is the rider who often has to do the hard yards, setting the pace or riding at front to allow other team members - those who are aiming to win the race - to enter their slipstream.

"Help them while still doing well ourselves," Fuller said of the aim of the team's domestiques.

The action began on Sunday with stage one running from Glenelg to Aldinga. There's no easing into things for the women as the 110.4km stage is their longest day on the bike in the Tour.

Those kind of challenges are the ones Fuller thrives on though, as proven by her answer when asked which stage she was looking forward to the most.

"Stage three has a pretty steep climb up the Corkscrew," she said of the gruelling Adelaide to Campbelltown leg.

"I remember I came here in 2019 with some friends and they told me I should ride down this hill as there was really nice views. I was like 'yeah, sure' and they told me they'd wait back at the top.

"I rode to the bottom and then it was hell riding up that. So that will be interesting this week."

While there's plenty of tests that await Fuller at Adelaide, she goes in with confidence after performing well at the road nationals at Ballarat.

Her build-up to nationals was different this year as she gave herself three weeks off the bike when she returned to Australia in October, something she normally wouldn't do.

"There's always room to improve but leading into Oceanias (Oceania Road Race and Road Time Trial Championships) coming up, the third was a really good start and hopefully I can improve on that," she said.

"It was a bit different but you just have to build differently. It's also hard in Dubbo because there's not a lot of racing so it's hard to get that racing exposure but I was doing a far bit of motor pacing which Gus (Dawson), which was quite beneficial."

The road nationals were another success for Dubbo Cycle Club.

As well as Fuller's medal in the under 23s time trial, Ben Anderson won bronze in the criterium while Isabelle Fuller and Kurt and Dylan Eather also performed admirably and received a huge amount of support from their home club.

"Coming back to it, you don't really how good it is until you go away for such an extended period," Fuller said of the Dubbo Cycle Club support.

"Everyone is so helpful and it's such a family-like environment. (Coach) Gus puts in so much hours and time so we can all achieve the best we can."

The Tour Down Under carnival runs from January 13-22 while the busy Fuller will follow that by competing in the Cadel Evans Great Ocean Road Race, another UCI WorldTour event, on January 29.

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