Primoš Logric managed to survive late-stage attacks by his closest rivals in the general classification to hold his lead - barely - and won the Critérium du Dauphine for the second time in his career on Sunday. It was the smallest advantage since Christophe Moreau won the race in 2001 with a one-second margin over Pavel Tonkov.
Entering the last day's race, another difficult mountain trek after the Queen stage, Roglić had a seemingly impregnable margin of 1:02 seconds at Jorgenson and 1:13 at Derek Gee (Israel-PremierTech). However, it was almost undone with the last rise of the Cordegriere rise (9.4% at 7.1 km), with some steep pitches exceeding 10%.
The Slovenian had to wait a distance in the last 5km after Jorgenson and Zee followed an attack from former Spanish champion Carlos Rodriguez (Ineos Grenadier) as Roglić watched the trio pull away from him and the acceleration that roglić simply could not follow was that he continued to crawl down his path and dance. The distance between the strong
leaders to try to limit the image continued to increase, but Rogic crossed the finish line with the road slightly flattened in the final two kilometers, 48 seconds behind stage winner Rodriguez and runner・up Jorgenson.
"I was hearing all the gaps [from his DS] all the time. I was glad that others did not go fast. I was just tired. It was close, but in the end, I'm happy for the team.Roglich said.
This time around the Slovenian's overall victory was quite different from his first victory in 2022. 2 years ago, Logric and his then Jumbo Visma teammate Jonas Vingegaard ran together to win the final stage, winning the overall title with a 3rd place difference of 1:41 to his non-team-mate rival.
This year, Roglić not only came to the Tour de France warm-up race with his new team, Bora・Hansgrohe, but also came to History when, after being injured in a terrible crash at Itzulia Basque Country on May 4, Lello glitch went down in a massive crash that caused the neutralization of Stage 5. It seemed to be repeated. But after receiving evaluation from the medical staff of his team, he not only started the next day, but also claimed the victory of the mountain top stage and became power away to take over the yellow leader's jersey.
"It's crazy to be able to win the Dauphine after everything that happened, crashes and everything that happened in between. It's incredible.
The eight-day stage race was not only an opportunity to test his form, it was also an important test for his team. After all, they only raced together 14 days before last weekend's start. Bora-Hansgrohe also scored the best team classification, scoring more than 7 minutes in Ineos Grenadiers.
"There is no doubt that the team needs to work on positioning, communication and a lot of things. I haven't been with these guys for five years.
When asked if the victory increased his confidence in the Tour de France, Rogic was his usual stoic self.
"Now the Dauphine is one thing and the tour is another. I want to be happy first, because you do not win such a race every day."
"Sure, you take everything you get in the end or you have to take,"" Rogic told FloBikes and other reporters at the finish line when asked if he would take third place in today's Tour de France if offered a chance.
"But still in the beginning, everyone has the same potential. In order to win it or become a second, third or any position, first of all, we must be happy with the whole team that really did a great race. Well done we have to enjoy it. And just go on a tour and relax.”
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