Team car drafting incident Primož Roglič time sanctioned for | Video

Primož Roglič and two of his team mates got in behind a team car on their way back to the bunch not long before the big final climb to the finish began on stage 15 today at La Vuelta

Primož Roglič finds himself a little further behind race leader Ben O'Connor ahead of the second rest day at La Vuelta after the three-time race winner was penalised for drafting on a team vehicle.

Roglič (Red Bull-Bora-hansgrohe) dropped O'Connor (Decathlon AG2R La Mondiale) on the final climb of Cuitu Negru and it looked like he had cut the Australian's advantage from 1:21 to just 43 seconds.

However, when the commissaires had a look at an incident before the final climb began, they sanctioned Roglič with a 20-second penalty and the gap to O'Connor is still 1:03.

Roglič had stopped to change onto a special climbing bike as the remains of the main field still had almost 25km to race. However, as he made his way back to the group he drafted off a team vehicle, as did two of his team mates.

Advertisement

As a result, Roglič - and team mates Dani Martinez and Roger Adria - were penalised by 20 seconds and 15 UCI points. The penalty was for "sheltering behind or taking advantage of the slipstream of a vehicle", with all three also fined 200CHF.

Related News

Red Bull-Bora-hansgrohe sports director Shane Archbold - Sam Bennett's formed lead-out man - was also fined 500CHF for his role in the drafting incident, which appeared to be brief, as well as 1000CHF for the manner of his driving.

However, while the incident - especially the 20-second time sanction - is a blow for Roglič, he has looked stronger than O'Connor and should overtake him in the general classification, perhaps as early as Tuesday when the race resumes with a very tough mountain stage to Lagos de Covadonga.

But he time sanction just might become a factor between Roglič and Enric Mas; the Movistar man who is now 3rd overall and has been the only man able to distance Roglič on this year's race, though hasn't been able to make that stick yet.

Related News