Tadej Pogačar will head to the Tour de France with only two days of racing in his legs this month as he confirmed that he won't be starting the Tour of Slovenia.
The two-time Tour champion is on the road to recovery from a wrist fracture sustained at Liège-Bastogne-Liège back in April. He's been back training on the road since last week and is currently at UAE Team Emirates' June training camp at altitude in Sierra Nevada.
Pogačar is part of a 13-man group in Spain including his key Tour de France lieutenants Adam Yates and Rafał Majka, although he will stay on to train as others head off to pre-Tour warm-up races, the Critérium du Dauphiné and Tour de Suisse.
Speaking in a press conference from Sierra Nevada, Pogačar confirmed his June plans, with two race days at the Slovenian National Championships his main preparation for the Tour outside of altitude training.
"Unfortunately, I lost some training and couldn't do much on the road in the last four weeks, so I need to focus a little bit more on the intervals and long training outside," Pogačar said of the Tour of Slovenia.
"I've been training quite good until now. Home trainer, running, start now this week on the road. The shape is not so bad as I thought it was going to be after the rollers. Now I'll try to get as much as possible out of this camp.
"Normally I really like to have a race before the important race. But a Grand Tour is 21 stages and sometimes it's good to be a little bit fresher. I'll do the National Championship so two days of racing. You can always do some good training behind the motorbike and stuff like this to simulate races, so I'm not so worried this year.
"I have great support from the team, and I can do big hours on the bike, have massages and physiotherapy here. It's a lot of work and on Jun 11 I go to do a recon of a few stages. Then back on Sestriere training camp. Then hopefully I'll do the National Championships TT and road race."
Pogačar will head to Sestriere in Italy for one last camp after a recon of several key stages on June 11, while next Monday brings a CT scan on his wrist to check on how the scaphoid bone in his wrist has healed. Broadly, things are looking on track for the Tour and a rematch with reigning champion Jonas Vingegaard.
He did say, however, that his wrist may not be at 100% for the Grand Depart in Bilbao but noted that the injury shouldn't hold his legs back from being in top shape when the race kicks off on July 1.
"Hopefully, I'll be at 100%. Maybe the wrist will not be at 100% but I think the legs can be because you don't need a wrist to train the legs. We will see that when the Tour goes, but I think I will enjoy it in any case."
Is Pogačar worried about the tough, hilly opening stages to start the Tour, given it's a possibility that he'll be starting the race with his wrist not in perfect condition? No chance. On the contrary, he said that he actually prefers the hard start to the race versus a cluster of flat sprint stages as was the case in Denmark last year.
"The first two stages are really beautiful and super hard. I think I prefer this to having flat stages in the first week because you already see who is there, who is what, who has the jersey," he said.
"It's not so stressful in the next days. It's going to be tough to come there fresh and immediately go full gas in the first two days but two years ago, it was more or less similar. But I felt good back then, so I really like this start to the Tour."
'The wrist is getting better every day'
The status of his wrist, if not the state of his legs, will be the biggest question hanging over the upcoming weeks in the lead-in to the Tour. Pogačar said that he might still be wearing a cast when the race starts next month but noted that he's feeling better every day.
"First of all, I shouldn't go on the road before six weeks, so I'm a bit stupid and I disobeyed the doctor's orders. I pushed the team and tried to go on the bike, but I knew that I couldn't put too much pressure on the scaphoid," he said.
"Obviously, I'm riding with a plastic cast that I can take off and on. Now I have a few different casts – one for normal life, one for the bike, and then one for when I'm almost at the end for a bit of support. I'm taking care every day.
"The wrist is getting better every day and I'm getting more and more mobility. When we see the scan, we'll see if we can start to put more pressure on the hand and I think for the Tour maybe I'll still need some soft brace around the wrist, just for a bit of support. I hope that I get the mobility to get out of the saddle and for sprinting before the Tour."
With Giro d'Italia champion Primož Roglič having confirmed that he won't be heading to the Tour and world champion Remco Evenepoel, who was forced out of the race midway through after coming down with COVID-19, also not riding, Pogačar's big rival will once again be Vingegaard.
He said that he would've liked to see Evenepoel at the Tour – the Belgian returns to racing at the Tour de Suisse next week – but understands why neither man will be racing in July.
"Remco abandoned the Giro where he could've battled for the win. He's the world champion so if I was him, I'd go for the Tour de France. But everyone is different, and everybody feels different on the bike after such a hard race and COVID-19
"I would love to see him at the Tour. It would be an even bigger competition and the same goes for Roglič. But I think Jumbo has a clear leader with Jonas at the Tour and Roglič won the Giro, so for them it's a perfect situation. Maybe they don't want to push Primož too hard and save him for the Vuelta, I don't know."
