Rohan Dennis continued his matriculation into the world elite in yesterday's world championships time trial where he got the chance to spend some time in the hot seat before ultimately finishing 12th. Despite a highly successful first professional season that includes an overall win in the Tour of Alberta, a top 10 in the Criterium du Dauphiné and a Tour de France debut, the Australian is in Florence purely for the learning experience and harbours no personal ambitions in Sunday's road race.

A fantastic ride against the world elite in last year's Tour Down Under and several impressive results as an U23 rider had lifted the expectations for Rohan Dennis prior to his first professional season with Garmin-Sharp. The young Australian has fully lived up to those by putting in one standout ride after  the other in big races all over the world.

It all started off on a bitter note when illness forced him to forfeit his participation in his home race down under and his first races in Europe didn't go according to plan. However, his legs started to come around in the Tour of California when he finished 3rd in the time trial, and his real breakthrough came at the Criterium du Dauphiné in June when he wore the leader's jersey and finished as best young rider in 8th.

The performance earned him a surprise selection for the Garmin-Sharp Tour de France roster. He gained plenty of experience during the first week but at this point in his career a three-week race was too much for the 23-year-old and so he didn't start stage 9. This month he added the first major stage race to his palmares when he won the inaugural Tour of Alberta.

The learning experience in the biggest races continues at this week's world championships where Dennis is doing the full schedule. He was part of the Garmin team that finished a disappointing 8th in Sunday's team time trial and yesterday he got the chance to ride the longest time trial of his life when he lined up in the race against the clock.

When Dennis crossed the line, he was 2nd behind Belarusian Kanstantsin Siutsou and so got the chance to spend some time in the hot seat. When the big favourites finished their rides, he fell down to 12th, having lost 3.09 to a dominant Tony Martin.

However, it wasn't all about the result for Dennis. He may have finished 2nd behind Martin in a similarly flat time trial in the Dauphiné - beating Chris Froome into 3rd - but in Florence, it is all about the learning experience.

"I'm satisfied," he told CyclingQuotes after returning to the Australian bus. "Obviously, it's a long time on your own. It's the longest time trial I've ever done. It's a new experience. Hopefully, I can really learn a lot from this with my coach for future world championships."

The learning experience continues on Sunday when Dennis will ride the longest race of his career. He is part of a strong Australian team that contains strong climbers like Richie Porte and Cadel Evans and he is ready to his do job for the leaders as long as he can.

"We will have our chat [about tactics] in a couple of days," he said. "We don't have an exact game plan yet. I won't be a leader. It's just about getting experience and helping the guys."

Dennis also elaborated on his 2014 ambitions. You can read more about that in a later article on CyclingQuotes.