Early life Haussler was born to a German father and Australian mother and raised in the town of
Inverell, New South Wales, Australia, before leaving for Germany in 1998 at age 14 to pursue a dream of being a professional cyclist.
Professional career Haussler turned professional in 2005 and shot to prominence with a stage win in the
2005 Vuelta a España. Haussler took out five wins in 2006 and has had strong classics campaigns since then. He looked set to be a rider of the future in the classics, in 2009 coming in second in both the
Tour of Flanders and
Milan–San Remo, narrowly beaten in the latter by
Mark Cavendish in a photo-finish. He also finished a strong 7th in the 2009 edition of
Paris–Roubaix. Haussler's biggest victory so far was the win of Stage 13 in 2009
Tour de France. Haussler lived in
Cottbus starting in 1998, and in 2009 in
Freiburg im Breisgau. The UCI, however, insisted that if Haussler wanted to ride for Australia he would have to give up his German citizenship, which the cyclist said in a November 2009 interview "is not open for debate at the moment". In July 2010, the Cervélo Test Team announced that Haussler would indeed give up his German citizenship and will ride for Australia in the future. However, a nagging knee injury forced Haussler out of what would have been his international cycling debut for his birth country at the 2010 World Championships. On 26 August 2010, Haussler's employer, Cervélo Test Team, confirmed rumours that it would cease to exist after the end of the current season. On 1 September 2010, it was announced he would be joining the for 2011. In the
2012 Tour of California, Haussler was denied victory on the four first stages of the race by
Peter Sagan of the squad, who beat him to the line each time. He would have to settle for second on every one of those stages. Haussler left at the end of the 2012 season, and joined the new team for the 2013 season. In 2015 he won the
Australian National Road Race Championships for the first time in his career. He also began competing in
cyclo-cross in 2019, and competed in the
2021 UCI Cyclo-cross World Championships. ==Major results==