‘I have no clue’ - Roglic admits Vuelta fitness doubts as he confirms Lotto talks

Primož Roglič (Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe) has admitted he has “no clue” what condition he is in ahead of the Vuelta a España after a training crash has left him spending much of his preparation in rehabilitation rather than training.

The Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe rider was hit by a car during a training ride in July, an incident that forced him to miss both the Clasica San Sebastian and Vuelta a Burgos, leaving his chances of riding the Vuelta at 50/50.

Red Bull confirmed earlier this week that the four-time winner will take to the start in Monaco on Saturday, but Roglič admitted on Thursday that the road back to racing has been far from straightforward.

“Instead of preparation, I did rehabilitation,” Roglič said during his pre-race press conference on Thursday.

The Slovenian suffered a large haematoma when he hit the ground after being struck by a car while training.

“The speed was not really high, super low. But I just hit straight on the ground, on my side, on my ass. So luckily, my big ass saved me. I didn’t break nothing,” he remarked. 

“If you would ask me now still, 10 days back or something. I wouldn’t say that I could sit on the TT bike. I mean, putting my socks on my feet was the hardest thing to do for at least three weeks.”

Roglič has only recently been able to resume meaningful training and is uncertain how his disrupted preparation will translate into race form, given he still feels some discomfort.

“I mean, I definitely still feel it. I can’t lay on my right side. But whatever, forget about it, good enough to ride the bike and to come here to start the Vuelta.”

The opening stage in Monaco is a short 9.4km individual time trial, which Roglič believes gives him a manageable introduction to the three-week race.

“I'm lucky that it's not a 30km time trial, that you have to be in the position, I don't know, to do 20 minutes in a row,” he said. “With this kind of parcours, maybe, yes, I can start with, and then we will see the next days how it goes.”

However, the opening week is heavily loaded with challenging stages, meaning Roglič will quickly find out whether he is capable of competing in the GC, as he highlighted with a difficult stage 4 in Andorra.

“Probably, wanted or not, with these stages, I will get already some answers,” he said. “And it depends on that, we will see then for later on, for the second and third week, actually how to manage it and how to turn it.”

The presence of his compatriot Tadej Pogačar is only likely to compound the difficult nature of the opening week as the world champion showed at the Tour de France in July that he can decide the race very early on.

Roglič was reminded of the 2019 Vuelta, when he claimed his first overall victory while Pogačar finished third on his Grand Tour debut, his last appearance at the race.

“Maybe it was the last time I beat him or something, I don't know,” Roglič joked. "I mean already finishing on the podium [in 2019] is incredible. He was super strong, yes on the last day."

The Slovenian was also asked about reports linking him with a move to Lotto-Intermarché for 2027. 

Roglič will leave Red Bull at the end of the season, and Het Laatste Nieuws reported last week that he had been in talks with the Belgian team. Roglič confirmed that talks have taken place.

“Yeah, actually, I think I can confirm that I spoke one time with them, but also that was just super recently actually. And the news or everything was out already, I think weeks in front or whatever. I mean, a lot of people know a lot more actually than me, but yeah, at the end, yes, we spoke.”