Primoz Roglic has his sights set on the third victory in a row at the Vuelta a España. There are also three Austrians at the start.
To the good: Defending champion Primoz Roglic on the final stage of the Vuelta 2020
The 76th Tour of Spain will open with a 7.1 kilometer short individual time trial on Saturday, and once again the focus will be on Olympic time trial champion Primoz Roglic: As in 2019 and 2020, the 31-year-old Slovene is aiming for overall victory. The Spaniard Roberto Heras recently achieved three successes in a row (2003 to 2005), with a positive doping test he also triggered the affair surrounding the gynecologist and doping doctor Eufemiano Fuentes.
It is suspected that before the penultimate stage of the Vuelta 2005, Heras was mistakenly given blood from another athlete that was contaminated with the blood doping agent EPO. The victory was withdrawn from him, but ultimately awarded again in 2012 because the doping samples had not been stored in accordance with the regulations. To top it off, Roberto Heras received 724,000 euros in damages from the Spanish Cycling Association and the Spanish Sports Council in 2017.
Primoz Roglic, on the other hand, can be pleased that his compatriot Tadej Pogacar is staying away from Spain – the two-time Tour de France winner is preparing for the road world championships in Belgium, where he wants to win the gold he wants at the Olympics in Tokyo just missed.
Strong duo from South America
Jumbo Visma professional Roglic knows the main competitors very well: Giro winner Egan Bernal from Colombia and Richard Carapaz from Ecuador (Giro winner 2019) are supposed to bring Ineos' first Vuelta since Chris Froome 2017. One thing is clear: with nine mountain finishes and a 33.8-kilometer time trial on the last day, it will be an uphill battle until September 5th.
Felix Großschartner, the ninth of last year, is hopefully pedaling, assisted by the Tyrolean Vuelta debutant Patrick Gamper in a Bora-hansgrohe dress. The Upper Austrian was most recently in Sardinia and Mallorca, “I had a good adaptation to the heat, that is certainly an important factor,” as the 27-year-old explained. Temperatures of up to 38 degrees are expected for the opening weekend in Burgos, and the heat wave should end next week. Großschartner advantage: “Last year I came out of the Tour de France to the Vuelta. This year I was able to rebuild my form. ”
The hunters from Ineos: Egan Bernal (left) and Richard Carapaz
Debutant and unlucky
Another debutant for Alpecin-Fenix is Tobias Bayer, the 21-year-old from Upper Austria is contesting his first Grand Tour in Spain. Most recently, he showed on the Burgos tour that the ambitions of Gregor Mühlberger (Movistar) abruptly ended – the left ulna was broken in a fall. The Lower Austrian should finally have used up all the bad luck for this year after a meningitis had forced him to go passive in the spring.
