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Primož Roglič showed his best form in years in the Vuelta a España Friday, demolishing all of his rivals with two days to go.
The three-time overall winner moved a huge step closer to a record-equalling fourth title, taking a chunk of time out of everyone else and wresting the red leader’s jersey off the shoulders of Ben O’Connor.
He also won the stage after his Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe squad reeled in the day’s breakaway, but hinted that was against his wishes.
“I said I don’t need the stage, but … I will not say their names, but some guys said, ‘we don’t listen to you anyway, we pull. We have nothing else to do,” he told Eurosport.
“In the end, I had to make a call and I said, ‘okay, then at least we all have to be on the same side and then we go for it.’”
Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe buzzing with energy
Roglič’s victory was the 15th stage win of his pro career and his third of this year’s race. Being ambivalent about going for the stage victory might seem strange, but he has seen other teams fade and with the hardest day of the Vuelta on Saturday, may well have wanted to conserve Red Bull’s energy for stage 20.
Winning was good. If the team falls apart Saturday after its exertions Friday, though, he will not be happy.
Still, there was no sign of weakness on stage 19. After working for much of the day to bring things together on the final climb, his teammates went eyeballs-out 5.8km from the line.
Dani Martínez lit the fuse with a massive acceleration, and then Aleksandr Vlasov took over with a sustained surge of his own.
No other rider tried to go with them. No other rider could.
“Neither Richard Carapaz nor myself really wanted to react at that point,” Enric Mas (Movistar Team) said afterwards.
“There are not many riders who would be able to keep up with kind of effort. Maybe Tadej [Pogačar] or Jonas [Vingegaard], but we were just not capable of going into that.
“Maybe we just had to regulate ourselves a little bit at that point.”
He later bolted clear but it was too little, too late.
“I got to within 20 seconds, but I just could not do it,” he said.
Roglič has prior knowledge of the climb, having won on the Alto de Moncalvillo four years ago. On that occasion he finished 13 seconds clear of Carapaz, and 19 ahead of Dan Martin.
This time around he was far more dominant.
“I had some really nice memories from this climb. It didn’t disappoint me. [It was] beautiful,” he said.
Strongest ride in three years
In finishing 46 seconds ahead of David Gaudu (Groupama-FDJ) and Matthias Skjelmose (Lidl-Trek) Friday, and with Mas a further four seconds back, Roglič did something notable.
Winning that way was his most dominant ride in years. The majority of his individual victories come in small group sprints or late mountain-top surges, with time bonuses and strong time trial performances helping him to many of his stage race successes.
Beating the next rider by 46 seconds is something else. It’s his best showing since stage 17 of the 2021 Vuelta. On that occasion he reached the finish line at Lagos de Covadonga 1:35 ahead of his then-teammate Sepp Kuss and seven others.
Friday’s performance was more typical of Pogačar or Vingegaard rather than recent-years Primož Roglič.
That poses a huge problem for his rivals. He’s now 1:54 ahead of O’Connor and 2:20 up on Mas. With two stages remaining, and one of them a time trial, it is almost impossible to see any other rider win this Vuelta.
Asked if he was amazed by the gap he established Friday, he replied in the affirmative.
“Definitely,” he said. “It is better than five minutes behind. I am happy with the way I am functioning, and definitely happy with the guys.”
Still, he didn’t want to take anything for granted. He dismissed suggestions the job is done with two days to go.
“It’s not really over,” he said. “Again, like we say all the time, the Queen stage is to come.
“It is the last one tomorrow, the big one. It will be definitely super hard.
“Then we don’t do the normal laps in Madrid, it is again a decisive day for the GC with a time trial. So it’s far from done.”
That’s strictly true, but his demoralized, demolished rivals will feel otherwise.
