Primož Roglič proves once again that he can fly up and down mountains, be it on bike or on skis. In this year’s decisive individual time trial in the Giro d’Italia to the summit of Monte Lusari, the Jumbo-Visma rider needed an unlikely help that even an elusive TV scriptwriter would find.
Trailing then-race leader Geraint Thomas (Eneos Grenadiers) by 26 seconds as the two sprinted into the 18.6km mountain time trial on stage 20, he made up for that deficit and put in another 14 seconds to pull the maglia rosa and carry it to Rome. For his first win on the Italian Grand Tour. But it wasn’t just the clock Roglic battled on Saturday, it was also a mechanical problem with his bike and his ability to stay calm.
The Slovenian came to a standstill on the crucial climb, and cameras caught him muttering “No, no, no, no” as he worked to put a sliding chain back on his bike. From behind, the Jumbo-Visma mechanic jumped into action from a trailing motorbike but fumbled with a replacement machine on the road’s steep incline. cycling newsBarry Ryan called it “20 seconds of panic” in his account of the incident.
Then, a spectator in a red T-shirt and shorts ran a short distance down the hill and sprang into action, providing the boost of a lifetime. It turned out that he was also a former ski jumping teammate of Roglic from Slovenia, Mitja Minar.
“I’m just putting my chain on [on] And I just thought, ‘Push, push, push, push,'” Roglic said shortly after the finale.
The right place at the right time doesn’t seem accurate enough for this text. “Unbelievable” was the term used by the winner of the new Giro to give the script an exclamation mark. The Jumbo-Visma team called it “nail-biting.”
“He’s a very good friend. He was my roommate back when I was a ski jumper,” Roglic explained. He was one of the four men in [Slovenian] The team when we were junior world champions in 2007, at the same venue in Tarvisio. It’s incredible, isn’t it? “
Mežnar and Roglič both made the Slovenian ski jumping team for the 2007 FIS Junior World Ski Jumping Championships. On the regular men’s hill, the Slovenian duo finished off the podium, Minar fourth and Roglic fifth.
Tarvisio, Italy was not only the location where the two competed in those World Championships 16 years ago, but the city also served as the start of the Stage 20 time trial.
Menard later spoke on Slovenian radio station Val 202 and confirmed that he was indeed the only spectator in the crucial section of the Mountain Time Trial who gave Roglic a surprising assist.
“It was completely unconscious. When I saw he was on the ground and had a mechanic, I was shocked,” said Minnaar, who competed in the 2010 Winter Olympics in Vancouver and finished eighth in the senior team hilly event.
“But then I was acting completely instinctively and tried to get him back in motion as quickly as possible to continue his fight. Everything unfolded very quickly.”
#Giro 🇮🇹 nail biting TT🫣💖 pic.twitter.com/7PFEYPkNQ2May 28, 2023
Ob pravem času na pravem mestu❗🚴 Primožu Rogliču je po sneti verigi pomagal Mitja Mežnar, nekdanji smučarski skakalec, s katerim je Roglič skakal v mladinski skakalni reprezentanci. Po 16 Letih sta spisala novo skupno zgodbo. 👏 pic.twitter.com/aKY7veqQhuMay 28, 2023
