For a record equalling 4th time, Primoz Roglic took home the Red Jersey from the Vuelta a Espana on Sunday evening in Madrid, ensuring Grand Tour success in his debut season with Red Bull - BORA - hansgrohe.
"He's a strange character, isn't he? He's been through a lot, but he's a great rider. I saw him enter the Giro, where he almost beat Tom Dumoulin in the opening time trial in the Netherlands," recalls Jose De Cauwer of Roglic's beginnings in his post-Vuelta analysis for Sporza. "Then you look: where did he come from? From Adria Mobil or something. What a career he has made! He has had more than one bad fall, but then he comes back great."
With a total of five Grand Tours now on his palmares, Roglic has positioned himself as one of the best Grand Tour riders of the modern era. However, the big one, the Maillot Jaune from the Tour de France still eludes the Slovenian. Now aged 35 as well, Roglic might be running out of opportunities to complete his set of Grand Tour triumphs.
"Maybe another podium in the Tour? That would mean as much to him as winning another Grand Tour. And winning the Tour will be a difficult task," assesses De Cauwer, casting his doubt on how much longer Roglic will be competing at the top level. "He's had a few bad falls already. So I don't know to what extent he will continue to cling to cycling."
"Last year he wasn't satisfied because he had to fit into the story with Sepp Kuss and Jonas Vingegaard. The Tour was a disappointment, but he still wins a grand tour: there aren't too many who can do that," De Cauwer adds. "Five Grand Tours won in total and then the way he started cycling. It was a fight against himself and cycling, with the story that he is a bad helmsman."
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