In the second row next to TotalEnergies’ cluster of vehicles in a line stretching down a long country boulevard on the outskirts of Viileneuve-sur-Lot, Roglič can reach the Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe bus in a matter of minutes. He went inside without talking to reporters to take off his torn race kit and damaged helmet, and after a shower, began a full assessment of the scale of his injuries.
“Now the doctors will examine him and we’ll see,” team manager Rolf Aldag told dozens of reporters crowding around a makeshift barrier erected between the bus and the road to give riders and staff some space.
The time loss was already in black and white: 2:27 on the main peloton, meaning that Roglic – already in the worst position among the ‘Big Four’ – was 4:42 behind race leader Tadej Pogačar (UAE Team Emirates has slipped below. , It was his second crash in less than 24 hours after falling late on stage 11 in the company of Remco Evenepoel (Soudal–QuickStep).
But unlike Thursday’s near-fall in the finish at Le Lioran, this time he was well outside the three-‘safety zone’, and the time gap marked on the result sheet when he crossed the line was.
Unsurprisingly, given the uncertainty surrounding the extent of Roglic’s injuries, none of Roglic’s teammates were willing to discuss the situation. Although he could have finished the stage, it may have taken some time for any underlying injuries to be discovered, as was the case with his teammate Alexander Vlasov when he broke his ankle on Stage 9, but he finished the day’s racing. Did it, but later the fracture became visible. medical check up. Its almost disastrous consequences for the Slovenian’s GC bid were also obvious, but as the staff were at pains to emphasize later, what really mattered was the rider’s health.
“He’s taking a shower right now so he cleans everything up,” Aldag said. “Obviously he came across the finish line, obviously he lost some time and that’s not good, and obviously we wanted to avoid that.”
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Aldag had not yet had time to talk to Roglic about how the accident occurred, what its physical consequences were rather than reasons for the team’s immediate concern.
He said, “No, everyone is thinking that there was an accident and we wasted a lot of time and all we care about right now is his health, because that’s the most important thing right now.”
Asked about the battle for the GC, Aldag let out a brief, hollow laugh and then said, “Right now we have other ideas than fighting for the podium.
“It’s really about how he is, like whether he can continue or not. We have the best medical team you can think of and we’ll see what happens tonight and tomorrow.”
In response to another journalist asking virtually the same question, he said he had no idea of the time being wasted. “I don’t know how much it is, about four minutes on GC, but it’s not significant or very relative right now. The main thing is that he crashed really hard and we have other riders to think about. It’s never good, it’s never good and it definitely wasn’t the plan.”
Aldag was certainly in no mood to start the blame game when a reporter asked him why the street furniture in the run-in might not have been marked that well.
”I think we deal with it every day – we all have cars in advance, we all knew that after a day like this everyone would be really tired, and things like that happen.
“They (road furniture) are good for the safety of people in normal traffic 364 days a year, but it is certainly not protective for the riders in the final. But no one to blame, it’s just there and we knew it would be there, I just don’t know if there was any option other than taking that road to reach the city centre.
As far as Roglič himself and its consequences, Aldag said, “He’s definitely hurt and we have to listen to our medical team, see what they think and what he can do.”
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Whatever the final result, the events of stage 12 for Roglič are, regrettably, the latest chapter in a series of misfortunes and crashes that have plagued the Slovenian at the Tour de France in recent years.
After losing the Tour to Pogacar on the last possible day in the Planes des Belles Filles time trial in 2020, in both 2021 and 2022, Roglic had to leave the race due to unfortunate crashes in the first week. In 2021, in a chaotic Stage 3 when he was one of dozens of riders to fall on dangerously narrow roads in the final, Roglic completed the course but ultimately abandoned a few days later. Then in 2022, he collided with a safety lapel on the Roubaix stage, dislocating his shoulder and injuring his back. Again, he continued to fight, but after the Alps he had to give up.
Roglič’s determination to continue for as long as possible was a tribute to his immense resilience which has always characterized the Slovenian, but this year he has suffered another series of mishaps.
Roglic, one of those who fell in a massive crash while leading the race in the Italuia-Basque Country this April, skipped Liège-Bastogne-Liège this spring. He returned to racing in the Critérium du Dauphiné and managed to win it overall. But during the race he fell in a heavy fall on Stage 5, making the stage ineffective, involving several riders and having an impact.
As far as the Tour is concerned, when Roglič spoke to reporters on the first rest day earlier this week, he was celebrating being in his best overall condition since 2020 – and with no accidents . However, Friday’s events caused the latest turmoil in Slovenia’s rollercoaster relationship with the race.
As usual in these situations, while the media were outside Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe and waiting for Aldag to speak, the ordinary and the everyday got easily mixed with the drama and tension currently engulfing the team.
An elderly French woman – apparently unaware of the latest developments – approached the waiting press officer to say that she had heard the team was giving away free gifts and, if so, could she give one, please. ? When she left empty handed, someone invisible took out his mobile phone from behind the curtain on the steps of the bus and took pictures of the waiting journalists.
The bikes were cleaned and packed, the team vehicles slowly separated from the group of vehicles parked on either side of the country’s narrow roads and drove to their respective hotels. In other words, the Tour de France is going on as usual, non-stop.
However, whether this year’s peloton will still include Roglic on Friday morning is anyone’s guess.
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