Tour de France 2021: Slovenian Primoz Roglic abandons the race

Published on : 07/04/2021 – 10:12

“Primoz Roglic will not take the start of the Tour de France today. He suffers too much from his injuries”, announced on twitter, Sunday July 4, the Jumbo Visma team in which the Slovenian races. , announced his Jumbo team.

In one audio recording Also posted on twitter, the Slovenian cyclist explains that “there is no point in continuing like this. (…) Now is the time to recover and focus on my new goals”.

The former ski jumper announced at the start of the year that his main objectives for the season were the Tour de France and the road race of the Tokyo Olympics, scheduled for July 24.

“I am very disappointed to have to leave the Tour but I must accept it as it is. I remain optimistic and look to the future”, continued Roglic who spoke of his painful journey since his fall at around ten kilometers from the finish in Pontivy (Morbihan).

“I didn’t think this fall would cause me to quit. I never look that far. After a few days, I saw that I was not making any progress in my recovery,” he explained.

“Even though I surprised myself in the time trial, I still had a bad feeling the following days. The long and difficult stages are taking their toll. I will now focus on recovery,” said concluded the one who had approached the Tour in the position of favorite with his compatriot Tadej Pogacar, winner last year.

After his fall, Roglic limited the breakage in the time trial on Wednesday in Laval, where he gave up only 44 seconds to the dominating Pogacar. But he paid the price for his injuries, multiple bruises, in the long stage (249 km) leading to Le Creusot (Saône-et-Loire) on Friday, before finishing very late, in the “gruppetto”, the first stage of mountain in Grand-Bornand.

After eight stages, he occupied 51st place in the general classification, almost 40 minutes from Pogacar, the new yellow jersey for this edition.