Friday, 29 March 2019:

Best Young Rider jersey wearer LUKE DURBRIDGE of Australia and Orica-GreenEdge greets the crowd ahead of the third stage of the 2014 Giro d'Italia, a 187km stage between Armagh and Dublin in Armagh, Ireland.

Australian teammates Luke Durbridge, Michael Hepburn and Lucas Hamilton between them have summed up life as a professional cyclist.

The Mitchelton-Scott trio have had an eventful 48 hours, with Durbridge's cobbled classics campaign over before it really started because of a race crash in Belgium.

Hepburn has personified the camaraderie in the sport, earning wide praise after video emerged of him helping out a crash victim in the same race.

Meanwhile, in Italy, Hamilton is the new leader of the Settimana Internazionale Coppi e Bartali race after finishing runner-up in the hilly second stage.

Durbridge's dream of winning the Tour of Flanders and Paris-Roubaix, two of cycling's one-day monuments, must wait another year after he went down in the Driedaagse Brugge-De Panne event.

He suffered a busted collarbone and a fractured finger, with the two injuries needing surgery.

In the same race, fellow Australian rider Zak Dempster (Israel Cycling Academy) also crashed.

Hepburn can be seen in race coverage dismounting and lifting a bike off Dempster as he lies on the road, to check on his condition.

"Heppy's is one of my good friends and I was sort of awkwardly stuck under my bike and winded, and I just heard him say, you alright bro?," Dempster said on Twitter.

"Then he started sorting the pile of bikes off me."

Hepburn and Dempster finished the race.

In Italy Stannard's second place behind Spaniard Mikel Landa (Movistar) meant he took the overall lead from teammate and compatriot Rob Stannard.

Mitchelton-Scott's strong performance in the previous day's team time trial mean they hold the top three spots in the overall standings.

Hamilton is 16 seconds up on fellow Australians Damien Howson and Nick Schultz.

AAP