It has been a long and cautious off-season for Primoz Roglic, who following his abandon from the Vuelta a Espana due to a crash, took almost three months off the bike, mainly due to a procedure meant to prevent him from dislocating his shoulder as frequently.
“I hope to gradually pick up my training again. It is now eight weeks after my shoulder surgery," Roglic said in an interview with Wielerflits. "It gets better every week, but such a recovery takes time. They took part of my bone and added it to the shoulder area. The first period after the operation I could hardly move my arm. Now, I still can't fully straighten my arm.”
Now finally, after a long time off the bike without training, the Slovenian slowly picks it up once again. Taking into consideration his long-term health he's taken the extra time to recover, and now he will begin to prepare for the 2023 season.
“Fortunately I am not a swimmer, because then such an intervention would have a much greater impact. In recent weeks I have carefully started back on the exercise bike with an hour of cycling every now and then last week I had a scan made, after which the doctors gave me the green light to cycle outside on the road again," he continued.
Roglic is unsure yet what his main goal will be for 2023, with the prospects of a Giro d'Italia return very realistic. He will surely however take some time to regain his best form, thus it is possible that he won't start the season in such dominant fashion as in previous years.
“It is tough because I now have a period in the middle of my career in which I have not been able to work on my fitness for almost three months. I had to take a rest to allow my body to recover properly," he stressed however. “Because of that mandatory rest, I suddenly had a lot of time. I spent a lot of time with my foundation and setting up events for this charity."
"In the end I now used the five to six hours in which I normally cycle every day for other purposes. Of course I also spent a lot of time with my family. But indeed, not being able to ride a bike outside for three months is quite a long period," the 33-year old added.
“My hope is that I can compete reasonably well again in January at the second training camp of the team," he concluded. The Dutch team will start a training camp on the 11th of December in Spain and he is looking to be able to start it.
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