Primoz Roglic rides to stage 20 victory with his Slovenian colours flying in the crowd. Geraint Thomas’s Giro d’Italia challenge crumbled as he wilted on the steep slopes of Monte Lussari in north-east Italy, allowing his closest challenger, Primoz Roglic, to move into the race leader’s maglia rosa by 14 seconds.
In a nail-biting climax to the three-week race, the 18.6km individual time trial finally revealed just how strong Roglic, of the Jumbo-Visma team, truly is. He survived a disastrous moment midway through the stage when he slipped his chain on the steepest gradients.
Despite that, he recovered his composure and carried on to win the stage by 40 seconds from Thomas, of Ineos Grenadiers. Roglic leads the 2018 Tour de France champion with only Sunday’s processional stage in Rome remaining.
Roglic, three-times winner of the Vuelta a España, has made a habit of snatching defeat from the jaws of victory, most famously in the 2020 Tour de France , and seemed as stunned as anyone by his success.
“It’s incredible,” he said. “My chain dropped, but I put it back. I could have lost everything. It’s not over until it’s over, but it looks good.”
Although Thomas started the time trial well, he never really hit his stride on the cruel and rough climb to the stage finish.
“I could feel my legs going a kilometre and a half from the top of the climb,” he said. “I don’t want to sound like I’m making excuses but I just didn’t feel like I had […]
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