Urska Zigart's injuries changed Tadej Pogacar's Tour de France schedule - And Primoz Roglic could end up benefitting

At the Tour de Suisse Women, Urska Zigart suffered a high-speed in a fall, caused by a speed bump on the road. The crash of Tadej Pogacar's partner put his plans on hold and reportedly changed his schedule. As it turns out, the latest plan had been for the duo to race the Slovenian national championships.

In Switzerland, Zigart was diagnosed with a fractured jaw after the crash, bad consequences at a time where the riders are not far from the Tour de France Femmes. At the hospital later that day Pogacar was reassured of her health, but when the race finished he was not shy in admitting the priority was to return home to Monaco to be with his partner.

The Tour's defending champion has in the meantime returned home but in a press conference after the end of the Tour de Suisse he had an interesting statement: "I changed a lot of plans in the last two weeks. Now that Urška is recovering, her plans collapsed, my second plan collapsed, and now it's the third plan and maybe in two days it will be plan four".

Understanding what the World Champion meant by this required connecting some pieces. AS journalist Daniel Arribas may have put together more pieces of the puzzle on what 'plan B' might have meant. This could be to travel to the Slovenian national championships this weekend, whilst Plan A should have been to travel to altitude right after the Tour de Suisse - with none of them now coming to be, and certainly the final steps in his preparation will take place in the Alpes Maritimes.

"Tadej Pogačar had planned to race in the Slovenian national championships (road and time trial), not to go to Isola 2000 (to altitude camp, ed.), but Urška Žigart's fall changed his plans," Arribas wrote on X.

Having been at Sierra Nevada over the past month, Arribas has gathered information on the preparation and schedule of several riders that used the mountain for altitude training ahead of a key period in the season. Amongst them is Primoz Roglic.

And according to the Spanish journalist, the Red Bull - BORA - hansgrohe is set to race the national, doing so for the first time since 2020. In the absence of Pogacar, Roglic could end up being a winner at home - in a year where his career may come to an end, as his contract with the German team is up in the air and there are no public indications of what follows.

Roglic has recently also raced the Tour de Suisse, although his form did not impress. The veteran rode to eighth in the overall classification. Later in the season, he will race the Vuelta a España where in the past he has conquered the red jersey on four different occasions already.