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"Day by day" can easily mean "we could stomp this but we pretend we're not panicking when we don't"
I hope Primoz wins Dauphine, so that he can make peace with this race, after what 2020 happened.
If he wins Dauphine, and becomes 2nd at the Tour, it was still a very good season: victories in PN and Dauphine, 2nd at TdF.
Oh man, autumn and winter now are coming so quickly; so let‘s enjoy these next weeks, these next races…
By the end of the Tour, contracts for 2023 are already made…
(For the cyclocross guys and guys from the southern hemisphere: just be patient for another few weeks - your season is coming soon …)
If he wins Dauphine, and becomes 2nd at the Tour, it was still a very good season: victories in PN and Dauphine, 2nd at TdF.
Oh man, autumn and winter now are coming so quickly; so let‘s enjoy these next weeks, these next races…
By the end of the Tour, contracts for 2023 are already made…
(For the cyclocross guys and guys from the southern hemisphere: just be patient for another few weeks - your season is coming soon
…)
I hope Primoz wins Dauphine, so that he can make peace with this race, after what 2020 happened.
If he wins Dauphine, and becomes 2nd at the Tour, it was still a very good season: victories in PN and Dauphine, 2nd at TdF.
Oh man, autumn and winter now are coming so quickly; so let‘s enjoy these next weeks, these next races…
By the end of the Tour, contracts for 2023 are already made…
(For the cyclocross guys and guys from the southern hemisphere: just be patient for another few weeks - your season is coming soon
I don't think Roglic will give a damn about finishing second in the Tour. In fact if there's one rider who'll risk a certain podium spot with a long range attack (if the Tour seems to be slipping away at some point), it'll be Roglic.
Say for example he's 2 minutes behind Pog heading towards the final TT in the last week. He'll risk the podium to win the jackpot aka no risk no glory. If he fails, he fails. No big deal.
Likewise I don't expect him to care much about the Dauphiné either. This summer & autumn it's Tour de France > Vuelta number 4 > Lombardia in terms of objectives.
I expect Roglic to try to pick up a Dauphine win if it's there for the taking. Mainly judging by the way he raced the Lombardia prep races in 2019 and 2021. And with this field, and this route, I don't think I remember Roglic being in a bad enough shape to not win this other than Itzulia which is purely down to injury.
I see no words that suggest he won't be fighting for the GC. Testing form is actually a strong statement suggesting that Primoz won't be invisible and I think he will put the hammer down on at least one stage (ITT), which could be enough to win the race.
I know. It's worded in a way which suggests winning the Dauphiné could be part of the ultimate goal which is the Tour de France, aka step one, basically. I simply concluded winning isn't the goal here because despite the vagueness of the comment I don't believe Grischa Niermann is particularly finicky or strategic with his words. I mean he's already said in another interview Vingego isn't riding GC, at all. I don't think he's playing mind games.
I agree. Also, in hindsight that injury still intrigues me.
Particularly the way in which it was eventually 'revealed' in Itzulia: Evenepoel attacked, Roglic looked like he was about to cover the move, then Jonas went & Rog sat down again. After that he just rode a casual tempo.
The entire episode could have also been handwaved as a tactical choice to let Jonas ride GC & frankly, people would have believed it with or without talk afterwards of a sore knee (or without the hilarious footage of Enric Mas squeezing his leg during the last stage).
I also mention this because of some interesting advice which Miguiel Indurain had for Roglic before Itzulia: Miguel Indurain says Primož Roglič needs to bet everything on Tour de France - VeloNews.com
It's also true that this same phenomenon of peaking too early & running out of gas was evident in Lombardia as well (he smashed Emilia & Milan-Turin, then faded on the Saturday).
So I honestly don't know what to expect in the Dauphiné nor do I think it'll say much about his chances in the Tour or form in 4 weeks time, unless he smashes it of course at which point it's business as usual.
He'd be best-advised to listen to BigMig. Until he's won that prize to his satisfaction he won't know exactly what it takes, with so much more pressure than the Vuelta or shorter SR. He seems really cool and collected but the Tour exposes rider weaknesses routinely and many racers are their own worst enemies. They don't know it until they overcommit too early but they certainly know afterward where the race ended for them. Or they should.
I don't love the Tour de France obsession. If he fails, I don't hope he keeps chasing it until he starts going backwards.
It's 2050. Pogacar ended his career years ago but Primoz is preparing for his 33rd TdF. Can he finally win the elusive title?
"It's hard to keep up with this up and coming guys but why not this year, eh?"
Considering the knee injury and how it was revealed. It has already appeared before Itzulia, but Roglič (and the team) believed it was nothing important so they decided to do the race anyways and not worry. He won the TT, but day by day, when the stages got longer and more demanding, the thing got worse.
Roglič himself told the press about it at the end of the race and apparently the team was not happy about it - either because they thought making an injured rider do a WT race would make them appear incompetent or because Roglič got the info out on his own without the team approval. I still don't know what they would say about the clear sub-par performance if the injury was not revealed by Primož himself.
Concerning the Dauphine, I think he will want to win it. He usually comes from the training camp in very good form, the Tour is still a month or so away, the competition is weak and the route allows you to go full on on three stages and cruise the rest. So ideal to take it as preparation and win at the same time.
And about the fading question - it is true - Roglič usually performs the worst at the end of the week. Not necesarily at the end of the race when it lasts for three weeks, but usually his biggest crises or worst performanaces came at the end of the week. He is usually the best like two or three days after the rest day. Therefore he is in luck that all the important stages (with the exception of the last TT) come at the begining of each week. Alps at the start of week 2 and Pyrenees at the start of week 3. Maybe this could help.
Roglič himself told the press about it at the end of the race and apparently the team was not happy about it - either because they thought making an injured rider do a WT race would make them appear incompetent or because Roglič got the info out on his own without the team approval. I still don't know what they would say about the clear sub-par performance if the injury was not revealed by Primož himself.
Concerning the Dauphine, I think he will want to win it. He usually comes from the training camp in very good form, the Tour is still a month or so away, the competition is weak and the route allows you to go full on on three stages and cruise the rest. So ideal to take it as preparation and win at the same time.
And about the fading question - it is true - Roglič usually performs the worst at the end of the week. Not necesarily at the end of the race when it lasts for three weeks, but usually his biggest crises or worst performanaces came at the end of the week. He is usually the best like two or three days after the rest day. Therefore he is in luck that all the important stages (with the exception of the last TT) come at the begining of each week. Alps at the start of week 2 and Pyrenees at the start of week 3. Maybe this could help.
If this is true, I'd go on an interstellar, galactical level super rant about Jumbo on a level unwritten, unposted ever before in the history of cycling rants.
The basic truth is Roglic is a super cool guy with humble beginnings from a small Alpine mountain country. If he was Dutch or Belgian, he'd be a demigod on a bike in that team. If he was French, he'd be an actual God & untouchable in the hierarchy (Thibaut Pinot for example is almost a cycling deity here in terms of popularity). Based on all the cycling salary 'leaks' as well, he's also underpaid vis-à-vis his peers boxing in the same GT category who with the exception of one Pogacar, he regularly smashes despite the fact they earn more.
So I don't like it when JV don't back him 110%, or when they think of themselves more. I don't like it when they shoehorn Vingego into joint leadership, just as I don't like it when they split team objectives with green & first week yellow jersey indulgences disrupting team cohesion on the road (ala Tour 2021). Do you think one of Big Mig's teammates would d*ck about chasing yellow up the road whilst their leader is behind? I don't think so.
I think honestly Roglic has proven a billion times he puts the team first & makes zero fuss, even when others (an extreme example being someone like Superman Lopez but there's a spectrum in between, for example as much as I respect & like the guy, WvA regularly uses the media to put pressure on the team for his own objectives) would throw a massive tantrum & publicly pressurize JV for xyz reasons when they don't get what they want.
So I don't know whether this "team was unhappy" story is true but it would explain some of the toned down social media pressence this spring (Roglic for example is a lot less trigger happy on Insta than he was in previous years). There's also the fact Dennis, Kuss & Kruijswijk were certain starters in the Tour & now they're not. Then Dumoulin's sudden retirement on top of all this as well, with merely a few semi (almost terse) lines posted about it on JV's Twitter account & website: Team Jumbo-Visma | Dumoulin announces his farewell (teamjumbovisma.com). Aka "Here's your hat, what's your hurry?".
Maybe it's my (now usual) pre-Tour de France jitters & hyper sensitivity regarding all things JV (because I don't trust these guys to get things right at all) but something seems 'depressed' in that team.
Yeah, if he doesn't succeed this time he needs to have a deep inner talk. His career has been spectacular to date and he has the skills to win other monumental races should he make that a season focus. The top 20 GT rider list is full of specialists that have ground themselves down a few times and Primoz should remember his career in later days for not being on that list at the expense of other cool races. He is a serious racer.
Slovenian RTV journalists who were on the site. The team gave out zero info to the press before, but Roglič just told the journalist and the team were "surprised he did so". They also mentioned Jumbo is always very reserved when it comes to giving any information to the press about the riders besides the racing part. They have very strict PR rules it seems. So it helps to have someone on the spot to fish out some details.
He had pain through the whole race and not a single JV article or tweet mentioned a single thing until Roglič talked about it.
But let us hope that is all in the past. The doctor that treated him is apparently very good at what he does and since that was basically 2 months ago during a "resting period" I doubt a couple of weeks of less intentisy riding harmed his preparation since he was back to 100% before they went to altitude.
Meanwhile some serious cycling in Slovenia.
S senÄnikom namesto sedeža: 'Da bo pivo ostalo hladno' | 24ur.com
"Znova pozdravljeni," se zasliÅ¡i pred 12. ovinkom vrÅ¡iÅ¡kih serpentin, po katerih odvijugamo Å¡e pred popoldansko zaporo. Cesta je namreÄ takrat rezervirana za tiste, ki v strmi hrib grizejo kolena na legendarnih kolesih brez prestav. In tako, kot je Goni pony v osmih letih postal že...
The NFL as an organization does so many things poorly or pathetically. But I do like that the league requires teams to post the injury status for every injured player, and report whether a player is “out,” “questionable,” or “probable” for a game. Of course they do this in their (owners) self-interest, it is probably related to gambling, and coaches still fudge a bit. But regardless of the intent, I think it serves the fans and players well. In cycling, if a team keeps a lid on news of a rider’s injury, the rider has to lie, and has to act as though a poor (injury-related) performance is because “the legs just weren’t there.” Sometimes we find out afterwards, which then can sound like excuse-making or sour grapes. Of course, teams do this if it gives a competitive advantage. But that is eliminated (for the most part) if ALL teams were required to report injury status leading up to a race, and get fined when they falsify that info.
Yup, I know cycling organizational structure is very different from tightly organized leagues, so that’s not likely to happen..
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I don't think any regulations can ever solve the root of (almost) all sport drama, aka sportsmen versus management & vice versa disputes.
There's a perfect symbiotic relationship in the best case scenario where both sides (in whatever discipline, but namely team sports) act with mutual best interests in mind. Problems happen when the management (for example) starts blaming its players (ala Jose Mourinho) or when the players (insert xyz underperforming star) blames management. Whether this is expressed publicly or privately, it's all the same, aka disunity.
Cycling is the most individual team sport out there. Merijn Zeeman (to name JV's TdF boss) can say or do whatever he wants, i.e. pick whichever riders in the team, tell them to say whatever he wants to the media & present whichever tactics in the team buss in the morning, but at the end of the day the Tour will always come down to Roglic having his legs on the day & being where it matters in the race.
Also, Zeeman might get job satisfaction after a good result but win or lose, Roglic himself will always get the glory when things go well whilst on the flipside he gets the sh*t shovelled in his face when he loses. That's the pressure, the risk & the reward of the job. I mean no one remembers Merijn Zeeman (after he was kicked out of the 2020 TdF) sitting at the side of the road during the Planche des Belles Filles TT with his stopwatch. No, the defeat, career defining moment, mockery, laughter & derision all landed on Roglic.
That's why I don't like reading things like "team was unhappy... etc.". I mean who gives a sh*t? It's not like he's Neymar or a party animal. He just races in whichever events they place him in & does whatever the medical staff & performance scientists tell him to. The rest is all down to him being a champion with the correct skillset & mentality.
This is probably all a moot point because I doubt there's any serious drama (nor do there appear to be any cracks... yet), but the point stands for future reference.
There's a perfect symbiotic relationship in the best case scenario where both sides (in whatever discipline, but namely team sports) act with mutual best interests in mind. Problems happen when the management (for example) starts blaming its players (ala Jose Mourinho) or when the players (insert xyz underperforming star) blames management. Whether this is expressed publicly or privately, it's all the same, aka disunity.
Cycling is the most individual team sport out there. Merijn Zeeman (to name JV's TdF boss) can say or do whatever he wants, i.e. pick whichever riders in the team, tell them to say whatever he wants to the media & present whichever tactics in the team buss in the morning, but at the end of the day the Tour will always come down to Roglic having his legs on the day & being where it matters in the race.
Also, Zeeman might get job satisfaction after a good result but win or lose, Roglic himself will always get the glory when things go well whilst on the flipside he gets the sh*t shovelled in his face when he loses. That's the pressure, the risk & the reward of the job. I mean no one remembers Merijn Zeeman (after he was kicked out of the 2020 TdF) sitting at the side of the road during the Planche des Belles Filles TT with his stopwatch. No, the defeat, career defining moment, mockery, laughter & derision all landed on Roglic.
That's why I don't like reading things like "team was unhappy... etc.". I mean who gives a sh*t? It's not like he's Neymar or a party animal. He just races in whichever events they place him in & does whatever the medical staff & performance scientists tell him to. The rest is all down to him being a champion with the correct skillset & mentality.
This is probably all a moot point because I doubt there's any serious drama (nor do there appear to be any cracks... yet), but the point stands for future reference.
IIRC @Libertine Seguros alone has had plenty of laughs on Zeeman for that Tour.
To be honest Jumbo really just has this PR thing with #samenwinnen where all the PR is all abou the team effort and all the PR is tightly regulated. I would not be surprsied if Roglic didn't think too much before admitting he was injured. After all, why not eh.
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I would argue that cycling is one of the most team oriented sports out there. And i guess with the least amount of credit in regards to team members. This last part likely could made someone believing it's really an individual sport. But it isn't. In the end it's a team effort that will enable you to win. Yes, sometimes not by your own team.
Posting an IG picture used to work just fine. Looks like those days are gone.
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