Primoz Roglic aimed for the Tour de France in 2024, having signed with Red Bull - BORA - hansgrohe to have sole leadership. He had to abandon the race but bounced back strongly to make up for it with a Vuelta a España victory; but at this time the Slovenian is already having his mind on the Grand Boucle for the upcoming season.
“In life there are not only successes and high moments, but also falls. What counts is always getting back up" Roglic said in an interview with RaiSport. "You have to try again and again, but above all I think that I have to keep in mind that things will fall back into place. That way it’s easier to move forward." For the third consecutive time he has abandoned the race, he crashed twice in two days and suffered a lower back fracture.
After the Vuelta he still raced the World Championships and tried to prepare for Il Lombardia, but ultimately it proved too much for him and he ended his season mid-week. "Later, I got to a certain point, in the end, that I simply had no more energy to race. I had exhausted the tank for this year, a season that makes me proud for everything we have achieved with the team".
The presence of an ever-evolving Tadej Pogacar (besides the likes of Jonas Vingegaard and Remco Evenepoel) makes it very hard to imagine a Tour de France victory for the man who almost won in 2020. But Roglic has one Grand Tour left to complete the set, and it is the main motivation for the years remaining in his career.
For next season, that's already marked on the calendar."The Tour will certainly be on the calendar, but I can't say if it will be the main objective. Maybe it's better that I choose some other race as a seasonal objective, and that the Tour simply happens... There are enough races, I will find my challenges," he explains.
But retiring is not in mind for Roglic, who continues to put out some of his best climbing numbers at age 34. "I don't think about retirement, it is not something that haunts me. I don't think about where and how much, I am here and I will run as long as I have the motivation to do so, as long as racing makes me happy. I don't want to project my thoughts too far ahead, I live this moment day by day".
Place comments
0 Comments
You are currently seeing only the comments you are notified about, if you want to see all comments from this post, click the button below.
Show all comments