Cycling
Primož Roglič: The pro cyclist who turns setbacks into showdowns
Initially a ski jumper, Slovenian Primož Roglič fought his way into the world's cycling elite - despite setbacks and defeats. Can he rewrite his Tour de France legacy with a triumph?
If you asked a hundred people who knew about cycling what the biggest defeat had been in Primož Roglič's career so far, ninety-nine would give the same answer: the Tour de France 2020, when Roglič lost what he thought was a certain victory on the penultimate stage.
The one person who would give a different answer would be Primož Roglič himself, Slovenian, father of two and one of the most successful cyclists in the history of the sport. Roglič would not say that he "wasted" the victory. He doesn't see the 2020 Tour de France as a defeat. In his eyes, finishing the world's biggest cycling race in second place is a success. And isn't he right about that? In any case, he hasn't made it onto the podium in the top three since then.
But why does the Red Bull - BORA - hansgrohe star cyclist evaluate this result so differently than the audience? Roglič wore the overall leader's maillot jaune for eleven days. Then came the twentieth stage, which was decisive for the overall classification: the mountain time trial up to La Planche des Belles Filles. Roglič is a good climber and a good time trialist. People thought the tour was decided. Primož Roglič didn't think so.
Dethroned by a countryman
Roglič still wearing the yellow jersey on the Col de la Madeleine in 2020
© Red Bull Content Pool
In the time trial, the riders start one after the other, in the reverse order of the overall ranking. So Roglič left last, at 5:14pm, after second-placed Tadej Pogačar, a Slovenian like him, younger and highly talented. Roglič was 57 seconds ahead of Pogačar in the overall ranking, which is a lot in a time trial over 36 kilometres. To lose 57 seconds over 36 kilometres, you either have to make a serious mistake. Or the other person has to have the best day of his life.
You either have good legs, or you don't have good legs
You hear sentences like that from Roglič all the time. He holds his head to the side, smiles, and gestures with his arms. "Sometimes you win, sometimes you lose." Or: "The race isn't over until it's over." Or: "Either you have good legs, or you don't have good legs." When he talks like that, you're never quite sure: is he serious, or is he just trying to get rid of the journalists? But what sounds like clichés may, in the case of Primož Roglič, be a truth that means a lot to him. He doesn't just say these sentences out of boredom or displeasure. He says them because he really means them.
From ski jumping to pro cycling: The unusual career of Primož Roglič
Primož Roglič, 34 years old, grew up east of Ljubljana in Slovenia, now lives with his family in Monaco and has been the leader of the Red Bull - BORA - hansgrohe team since this season, he is convinced that you can influence some things, but not others. For example, you can influence your own performance and your own motivation, but you cannot influence the route, the weather, the road conditions, the tactics of the opposing teams or the form of the other drivers. Whether you win or lose a race doesn't depend on you, but whether you give it your all does.
Rolf Aldag likes this attitude. Aldag, who once helped Bjarne Riis and Jan Ullrich in two Tour de France victories, is now Head of Sport at Red Bull - BORA - hansgrohe. He's just getting to know Roglič better with each passing day - and is becoming more and more impressed with each passing day. “Primož is one of the most open people I have ever met, but it is not a naive openness. He is not a dreamer. He's just open to all possibilities. He knows that things can be good but also that things can be bad. That’s what makes working with him so liberating.”
Roglič training hard
© Joerg Mitter/Red Bull Content Pool
And there's something else Aldag likes about Roglič: that everyone always compares him to former cycling greats, but Roglič himself often doesn't have much use for these names. He's not one of those professional cyclists who, as a child, sat in front of the television for hours watching bike races. He wasn't a fan and didn't know the winners' lists of the big races by heart. As a child, he wasn't even a cyclist. And even as a teenager, he wasn't yet.
Primož Roglič is what almost never exists in sport: a generalist. Successful in two completely different disciplines. He was a ski jumper, one of the most promising in the world. It was only a fall that ended his career abruptly in 2011 when he was 21 years old. He had problems with his knees - and somehow didn't feel like ski jumping anymore.
You have to be thin and have good legs
He sold his motorcycle – his favourite hobby horse then – and used the money to buy a racing bike. He realized that he liked the sport. And that there are similarities with his old sport: you have to be thin and have good legs. But there is also a big difference: what is needed in the legs is not explosiveness but endurance. Roglič got to work. That's what particularly appealed to him: that in cycling, you have to work very hard, but you're also rewarded for your efforts. He is someone who likes to work hard.
Cycling is his passion, but he also sees it as a career. He says that cycling is not just his life but actually the life of his entire family and that his entire everyday life is based on it. It's hard at times, but the fulfilment is even greater when you're successful.
Primož Roglič, Slovenian all-rounder from Red Bull-BORA-hansgrohe
© Joerg Mitter/Red Bull Content Pool
And he has had many successes since he signed his first professional contract in 2013 - at the comparatively old age of 23. His versatility is particularly striking: he has already become Olympic champion in the time trial, but he also won one of the most prestigious one-day races with Liège Bastogne Liège. He is considered the master of one-week tours, but his real speciality is the three-week, so-called Grands Tours - Tour de France, Vuelta an España, Giro d'Italia.
He won the Giro in 2023 and the Vuelta three times: 2019, 2020 and 2021. Only the Tour is missing. In 2020, he lost to Pogačar. In 2021, he crashed and gave up the race injured, likewise in 2022. Last year, he concentrated on the Giro in spring and the Vuelta in autumn and skipped the tour. Some people believe that Primož Roglič's career would only be complete if he won the Tour de France. Primož Roglič himself is by no means of this opinion.
One of the big favourites at the Tour de France 2024
He is ambitious and would like to win the Tour, ideally this summer with his new team. He will be one of the big favourites, despite a crash at the beginning of April on the Tour of the Basque Country when riding in the overall leader's jersey, he suffered painful bruises and abrasions. But if he doesn't make it, he has no problem with it. “Defeats are a part of life,” he says.
Defeats are a part of life
"You know," he says in conversation, "I'm pretty sure that if I won the Tour, it wouldn't make me a different person. And I don't want people to remember me because of that." He thinks for a moment. "If anything, I want people to remember me because I was the driver who always gave it his all. When I look back on my career, I would like to have been the one who enjoyed cycling and radiated that joy."
Roglič digs deep during Vuelta a España
© Gianfranco Tripodo/The Red Bulletin
What distinguishes Roglič from his rivals Pogačar and Vingegaard
In fact, watching Roglič race is a pleasure. He is not a joker like the high-flyer Pogačar, who seems to win the races with his left hand and also grins into the camera. Still, he is also not as reserved as the Dane Jonas Vingegaard, the Tour de France winner of the past two years, which appears calculated and somewhat boring. Roglič exudes something mysterious – on and off the bike. You watch him and ask yourself: Who is this person? And what's in it? What is he capable of? We got an idea of this last fall.
The mountaintop was covered in thick fog, and the roads were winding and narrow, but the images of the television cameras were razor-sharp. All the world could see what happened at the end of the seventeenth stage of the Vuelta a España, in the long, brutally hard climb to Angliru: Primož Roglič attacked his team-mate, the American Sepp Kuss, who was riding in the red jersey of the overall leader. And two kilometres from the finish, he left him behind.
It wouldn't make me a different person if I won the Tour
In the studio of Eurosport, the world's most important cycling broadcaster, the experts couldn't calm down after the race. “It's disloyal, disrespectful,” said former professional cyclist Adam Blythe, and Sean Kelly, one of the most successful cyclists of the 1980s, just shook his head in incomprehension. It's an unwritten rule that you don't attack your team-mate. Especially when you no longer have a chance of winning overall. And especially not when your team-mate is practically already the winner and just has to roll to the finish line.
What makes cycling a team sport?
For all those who are a little less familiar with the laws of cycling, we have to briefly explain something: Cycling - that's what makes it so unique - is both a team sport and an individual sport. It is an individual sport because, in the end, only one person stands at the top of the podium. Only one person can cross the finish line first. At the same time, it is a team sport because no one makes it to the top without support. As a rule, the supporters remain invisible, people like Sepp Kuss, who are paid to stand by their leaders, and people like Primož Roglič. They bring them drinks, protect them from the wind, and set the pace. In rare cases, however, the tide turns. Like just last fall.
The performer: Roglič is a top athlete straight out of a picture book
© Joerg Mitter/Red Bull Content Pool
Why didn't Roglič take the opportunity to thank his loyal helper? He has been asked this question many times and always answers it the same way. Firstly: "This was discussed with Kuss." Second, “I am only responsible to myself.”
I would like to have been the one who enjoyed cycling and radiated that joy
That is a maximally selfish statement. But it is also a statement that essentially describes top-class sport. Top sport isn't actually about winning. It's about doing your best. You don't really compete against others because of what the others do, how fit they are, how hard they push themselves; you can't influence that any more than you can influence the weather - it's out of your control. It is within your control whether you give it your all. And if you still have reserves in the tank but are holding yourself back, then you haven't given your best, then you've disappointed yourself, then you've lost to yourself.
There is great strength in knowing what is within and what is beyond your control. Primož Roglič has internalized this understanding.