Im not too much into Clinic. I usually dont want to throw **** without proves. But how many posibilities are that two guys from the same country dominate this way the sport, having into account that it is a country with no cycling tradition?
It was posted in here initially:
https://forum.cyclingnews.com/threads/state-of-the-peloton-2021.36806/
Post #10.
It looks like nobody cared that much since people feel like it is a given that they are doped. However there were different questions about the breaking of the records in almost every race in the last year. Sounds like the Slovenians are leading the way of the doped to gills riders among many others.
I've read your post a while back and wrote a very very very long reply, but I didn't finish it so the next day I decided not to bother and deleted it. I'll try again.
What exactly is the premise here? That the Slovenians have something that nobody else has? That's laughable. If they are on something, be sure that all the more powerful nations in cycling have it, too. Why Mohoric, who was btw a junior and U23 World Champion in consecutive years, isn't suddenly a World beater. Why the other Slovenians are nothing more than domestiques in their teams with an occasional stage win here and there? This is more of a trainer issue and team/team doctor issue if there is an issue. My first point.
My second point. The notion that Slovenia has no cycling tradition is false. In my deleted long post, I went more into details, but I'm not going to write it all again. Anyway, even in the former Yugoslavia, Slovenian cycling had the leading positions among Yugoslavian republics in the 70s and 80s. In the 80s and 90s it was closely linked to Italian cycling, meaning almost every cyclist that went Pro, went to an Italian team first. Every decade there were better and better cyclist coming out of Slovenia. From Jure Pavlic, Primoz Cerin (btw a close friend and advisor of Roglic), Gorazd Stangelj, Andrej Hauptman (bronze medalist in 2001 WC RR), Uros Murn, Tadej Valjavec, Jani Brajkovic, Simon Spilak to the ones active today with Matej Mohoric, Pogi and Rogla leading the way. In 2017 there were 13 Slovenian cyclists in the World Tour, the most ever. Today there are 7. It's a small number in absolute terms, but if you consider Slovenia's population, it becomes a big number in relative terms. But the number is still comparable (and doesn't stick out) to the number of Slovenians in top teams in the early 00s for example. It's just that you didn't have the Roglics and Pogacars of this World but the Mohorics, Tratniks, Mezgecs and Boles in the figure of Klemencic, Podgornik, Derganc, Murn, Hauptman, Stangelj etc.
Another couple of things important for the rise of Slovenian cycling are the creation of Tour of Slovenia in the early 90s and the stability of it's most important club Adria Mobil. Almost all the best Slovenian cyclist who became professionals in the last 20 years, went through Adria Mobil and then traded to a WT or ProConti team. Pogacar is a rare exception. He never rode for Adria but went from his team Ljubljana Gusto Xaurum (Rog-Ljubljana) straight to UAE.
There is also a cycling culture in Slovenia. You can see a lot of cyclist on the roads in every part of the country. The roads are mostly good, the terrain is very hilly and mountainous with lots of climbs. Also the amateur scene is pretty strong with lots of amateur races on those climbs. It's been this way for decades now.
If I go back in time again for a decade or so. In the late 00s and early 10s, there were very strong junior and U23 Slovenian national teams, that were comparable to the strongest teams of more traditional cycling nations. Teams when Brajkovic, Spilak, Mohoric all got a medal, Kump got a 6th place and Pibernik got 5th or 6th, Bole was also up there I think. Those were all strong teams in junior and/or U23 WC RR races. It shows solid work in Slovenian clubs' youth cycling movement.
All I've mentioned above of course is not at all comparable to the tradition of cycling nations like Belgium or Italy or France etc. But does this mean that Champions in this sport should come only from countries with big tradition? Why? Cycling has been steadily improving in Slovenia since the 80s. Is 40 years not enough long of a time span to produce a World class rider or two? Is it because there are two of them at the same time? Mind you, they are not the same generation. There is 10 years between them. This could very well be a coincidence. 10 years ago, we already had a similar situation with Brajkovic and Spilak. They weren't top of the top like Pog&Rog are right now. But they both could win a WT stage race at the same time and they did, in 2010. One won Romandie, the other Dauphine.
Another important point...
There is a very big tradition in sports in general in Slovenia. When I think of Slovenia, I think of a sport's nation. If you ask all the inhabitants, they'll probably answer you the same. We are mostly proud of our achievements in sport, and there are more than just few. It's not a coincidence Slovenia is often at the top of the list in medals per capita at almost every Olympics, summer or winter. Traditionally Slovenians are best known for winter sports (alpine skiing, ski jumping) and basketball. But in the last 30 years (since independence) there have been champions in handball, gymnastics, ice hockey, cross country, football, skiing, biathlon, rowing, sailing, volleyball, judo, motocross, athletics, sport climbing and the before mentioned ski jumping, alpine skiing and basketball. In all of those sports and probably some I missed, there was a sportsman/woman or a team from Slovenia that was at the top of the world or very close to it for some period of time in their respective sport or discipline. It was only a matter of time for a cycling champion to appear. And like I explained before. Cycling in Slovenia didn't start with Roglic, but way before.
There you have it. I hope it helps with some answers. I'm not saying they are doping or not doping. I just wanted to point out that it's not such a random occurrence for a top cyclist or two to come from Slovenia as it seems. They both also have had completely different paths to the position they are now. Roglic came from another sport in which he was one of the best prospects in the World, but a heavy crash messed with his plans and he lost motivation because he couldn't achieve his goal of becoming the best. He switched to cycling because he liked it and because at the time he was already winning amateur races. He was 22 at the time and had to learn absolutely everything of the sport. He's been steadily improving since then and is still improving. It's unbelievable but that's true. Every single year of his career he's been better than the previous one. A trajectory as steady as it gets. I challenge you, or anybody, to find and show me a rider (from whatever era) that has made as steady of a progression as Roglic has in the last 9 years.
Pogacar on the other hand has always been a prodigy of the sport. He started training when he was 11 and soon competed with cyclists 2 years older than him, but looked 5 years older than him, yet he was winning races. He went toe to toe with riders like Majka, Visconti and Haig in 2017 Tour of Slovenia when he finished 5th at 18yo. Next year he was 4th and won Tour de l'Avenir among other races. The rest is history.
I remember a press conference in 2018, I think, where Roglic jokingly said out loud: "Pogi you should wait a couple of years before going Pro, because you'll start winning immediately and there will be nothing left for the rest of us." Those words were so true.
Again doping, no doping, I don't know. All I'm sure is, there is no special magic potion that only Roglic and Pogacar use and no one else.
Facebook
Twitter
Instagram