Winter is for not doing excesses and not forgetting about the bike, spring is for doing crazy things in the classics, those for one day and one week, and summer is for showing off, so that everyone can see you, in France and abroad. then Spain. This Monday, when the 102nd Volta a Catalunya started, also coincided with the start of the spring season. No need for a department store to announce it. Primoz Roglic already proclaimed it in Sant Feliu de Guíxols, where he declared inaugurated what will be the great duel of the spring, the one that the Slovenian Jumbo player will have with Remco Evenepoel.
Roglic did not wait and struck first against the world champion. They are the winners of the last four red jerseys of the Vuelta España and now they want the pink jersey. It did not matter that it was an end on a straight line that went up in the town on the coast, not even a slope. Perhaps in another race, at another time, the favorites would have disengaged and let the sprinters do it. Ha, that was before. That doesn’t work like that anymore. Not now that Slovenia is in charge.
The Jumbo leader did not miss the opportunity to win his first stage in the historic Volta, where he had never raised his arms. It’s news, because Roglic, in addition to 10 partial victories in the Vuelta, three in the Tour and three in the Giro, also has wins and generals in Itzulia, Romandie, Tirreno-Adriatico, Paris-Nice and Dauphiné.
At the first exchange he put on the franjiverde jersey, which is missing in his collection. The Volta had six different leaders in 2022. It will be necessary to see if the Slovenian, who already acted as tyrant and controller in the race of the two Seas ten days ago, can keep it until Montjuïc. “You always hope for the best. Of course I want to win. But the others too. There are very hard days to overcome ”, Roglic lowered expectations at the finish line.
Evenepoel, ten years younger and who already has the same objectives as him and a similar, gluttonous, hoarding way of running, will not make it easy for him. With so much mountain, as of this Tuesday already in Vallter 2,000, they could have chosen to be conservative, not to risk. But then it wouldn’t be them.
You only have to look at the blows that the Belgian gave to his handlebars when he was beaten in the massive arrival by his rival, with whom he will fight in the Pyrenees and Mont Caro and later in the great Dolomites. Evenepoel thinks big.
Who will not be able to them in trouble is Adam Yates, one of the two leaders of the UAE, who was affected by an ugly fall 5 km from the finish line, at high speed, on a straight, in which Cataldo also went to the ground , Storer, Delaplace and José Joaquín Rojas, among others. The Briton lost 10 minutes, so Almeida remains the only option for the Emirates team. A problem that Education First does not have, with Carapaz, Chaves and Urán. Who is the real trick. “First come first. In Vallter, at this time, I tell you,” says Esteban Chaves.
