Vuelta a Andalucia Ruta Ciclista del Sol, Strade Bianchi, Paris-Nice, Volta Ciclista a Catalyuna, Tour de Suisse, Tour de France, Olympic Games Road Race, Olympic Games Time Trial, Vuelta a Espana, Giro dell’Emilia, Tre Valli Varesine, Il Lombardia
All-in for the Tour de France with the Vuelta as his eternal insurance policy. The only other race he should be particularly hyped about is the Tour de Suisse, a victory in which would complete an unprecedented accomplishment in winning all seven Big One-Week Stage Races.
Andalucia is a nice sunny warm-up race in Spain which was dominated by Pogacar last year. I do not believe Roglic has ever ridden it, so why not give it a shot? It is a great opportunity to pad his victory tally and dodge three of the other Big Four, assuming they do Algarve.
Strade Bianchi is a race in which Roglic has never performed well in. But he has not tried it since he leveled up in 2020. I do believe his best one-day riding is behind him at age 34, but he can at least get a bit accustomed to the gravel in preparation for stage 9 of the Tour, and who would not want to see the Big Four squaring off in this ethereal race?
I have put Paris-Nice on the schedule of Remco and Jonas for next season, only omitting it from Pogi’s because I want him to add Catalunya to his palmares instead (he won Paris-Nice last season). In reality, I would expect all four of these guys (and many other second-tier GC riders) to start Paris-Nice as it is the second or third-most prestigious one-weeker on the calendar, and next year a built-in recon for the conclusion of the Tour de France. I think Roglic should and will do the race again next year.
It is of course possible to do Catalunya as well, but my reasoning for keeping Paris-Nice off Pogi’s calendar next season is so that he can go heavy into the Classics without risking undue fatigue before the Giro d’Italia. Roglic is less likely to win (or even start) an Ardennes Classic next season, let alone a Cobbled one. So he can do Catalunya next year too, a race he added to his palmares last season, defeating Remco in a classic showdown.
That being said, Roglic would have an enormous gap in racing if he did not do any races between Catalunya and the Tour de Suisse. I know he performs well, like Remco, immediately after coming off of a long break (but of course training himself into oblivion on Teide). But I still think it would be a mistake to not make a run at Liege-Bastogne-Liege in between. He would be far less likely to win than when he managed it in 2020, and again I am selfishly placing the Big Four in the same race again. But it is La Doyenne, and with the current phenomenon in professional road racing where the best GC riders are also the best one-day hilly riders, they should all be attempting to add Monuments to their tally at all times. Pogi already has five. Remco has two, Roglic one, and Jonas zero. If nothing else, I believe the training block and race itself will aid Roglic in his quest to finally claim the Tour de France.
Roglic could also ride Romandie (a race he has already won twice) in May, if he was bored and felt it would help him mentally and physically for Le Tour. But with yet another Grand Tour double on the docket, he may elect for a calmer few months before the Tour de Suisse.
The Tour de Suisse is the one-week stage race of the Big Seven that Roglic has not won. He has steadily chipped away at the list in the past few seasons even doubling up on a few of them. And if he had not crashed out or cracked on the last day he would have won so many more races, like Paris-Nice three times instead of once, the Dauphine twice, the Tour de France, the Vuelta a fourth, etc… Despite his 80 professional victories, which is nearly double the number Froome ever won, Roglic should probably have won about 120 with his ridiculous peak level, consistency, and ruthless cunning (not to mention physical sprint ability) in the last meters of a reduced group scenario. He has made it a goal to win all seven of these races and I am 90 percent confident he will turn up in Switzerland next year and finish the job. And the press will get excited that he is a real contender for the Tour de France… Do you know who won the Tour de Suisse last year? Without looking it up. I do. Mattias Skjelmose. He showed up in France in July in decent shape, but could not even manage a competitive effort on a stage, let alone a GC result. Now Roglic is a higher-level rider; a proven champion and Grand Tour contender. But his expected demolition of a weak Tour de Suisse field does not a Tour winner make.
So we have come to a sign of the end times now: Roglic finally again in the thick of a battle for the Tour de France. It just seems right. So why a sign of the end times? At age 34, it may be his last shot. The European peloton, and the universe for that matter, among those of us who invest a portion of their mental health into the trials and tribulations of the story of the cycling world, well, it just won’t be the same without him.
It is, of course, impossibly difficult to fathom that July of 2024 will ever be a thing on November 1st, 2023. As I sit at a friend’s house in Colorado, at 5:30 AM writing this essay, the outside temperature hovers around freezing. The sun will not show itself for nearly two hours. Winter is creeping up on us all in the Northern Hemisphere. Time marches on ruthlessly toward that fateful day of December 21st, when we all begin to profit again in daylight. France’s brutal midsummer heat and humidity and the greatest cycling race on Earth cannot be further from reality; a trillion miles away in a faraway galaxy that mankind has yet to discover. It really seems like each day, we get further away from The Big One rather than closer to it. Time is truly a curious thing, so curious, in fact, I am altogether unconvinced that the human consciousness is capable of comprehending it.
For those of us fortunate enough, by the Grace of God, or whatever being or scientific formula orders the fate of the universe, to continue to walk the Earth on June 29th, 2024, the war commences in Florence, Italy. Roglic will be there, desperate to exorcise his demons in this, the biggest race that for several years, the best rider never won. Emotions will be running at a fever-pitch, to put it mildly.
As much as one is tempted to wax philosophical on Roglic’s 2024 campaign, and I have and will continue to as the Tour approaches, the elephant in the room is that Roglic is probably not going to show up in 2020 form, and even that would not be enough with a rampaging Vinegegaard and a killer Pogacar at the height of their powers. Throw Remco into the mix and sadly now, I think the best Roglic does is third place. His odds of winning the race, in my view, are less than 5 percent. My real prediction is a crash on the gravel stage and eventual DNF. Some things never change…
Roglic is a savage mental competitor too, but he would struggle to recover from that. If he stays upright and fights for the podium, he will probably be able to make peace with it and salvage his season.
The Olympic Games Road Race is a parcous that could be good for Roglic, but I do not know if he will give it a go. He is the defending TT champion, and I would imagine he would try to keep the title.
If he does not win the Tour de France, he will likely attempt the Vuelta for the sixth consecutive season. With his track record and assumed form, he could very well win it again, especially since his two big rivals probably will be on different teams.
Roglic could do a few Italian Autumn one-day races again; the same program as this year. The goal would be to finally win Lombardia. It will have been a long season, and I would not blame him if he shuts it down after the Vuelta.
I have not even mentioned that Roglic is switching teams next season. He will ride for Bora-Hansgrohe, which is a decent fit. He had to leave Jumbo-Visma to avoid domestiquing for/watching Jonas ride up the road into yellow in France. Bora is not nearly as strong as the killer bees, especially with the loss of flat engine Nils Politt to UAE. Their climbing squad is solid, but there really is not much a mountain domestique can do if Roglic drops hard in the Alps, especially on a penultimate climb. I am a firm believer that the strongest rider almost always wins a Grand Tour, so Roglic is really just rolling the dice on the form of Jonas, Pogi, and Remco next July.
It will take an enormous series of strokes of luck and a titanic emotional and physical struggle for Roglic to claim the ultimate throne in bike racing. There is a saying, I think attributed to Johan Bruyneel: There are no miracles in cycling. The realist in me is drawn to the cutting nature of the quote.
No, there are no miracles in cycling. Except there are, like when Sepp Kuss won the Vuelta just weeks ago. Of course Roglic can win the Tour de France.
I continue to discover myself as I write this blog. Am a cynic? An optimist? I think I oscillate violently between extremes. Perhaps I should strive for stability and balance; the Aristotlean Golden Mean. Maybe I should read more Ancient Philosophy. Who knows?
The bottom line is that despite my enduring attachment to the story of Tadej Pogacar, my heart will be with Primoz Roglic in July of 2024.
Puncheur 
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