Mathieu van der Poel and Primož Roglič will take no further part in the Tour de France, with both having decided to abandon the race before the start of today's stage 9 to Tignes.
Van der Poel (Alpecin Fenix) won stage 2 of the race last Saturday on Mûr-de-Bretagne and took the yellow jersey, which he only lost yesterday on the first day in the Alps.
He had always intended to leave the race early to focus on recovering and then preparing for the MTB race at the Olympic Games, which he has said is the main goal of his season.
“Unfortunately, I will not start today. We decided with the team that it is in my best interests to quit the race and focus on the Olympics,” he said.
“We knew it would be difficult for me. I have some other goals and due to the pandemic it was impossible for me to do the whole Tour and be on the top of my game for Tokyo. I had an amazing week and I’ll be back next year to go to Paris.”
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Roglič (Jumbo Visma) had a very different opening to week to Van der Poel. He crashed on stage 3, losing time and suffering severe injuries. Since then he has shed a very significant amount of time, including 35 minutes on yesterday's stage.
And now his team has decided that since his condition was not improving, there was no point in continuing. It said Roglič now needed to stop and recover before refocusing on his goals in the remainder of the season.
"We took the decision altogether with the team, it
doesn’t make sense to continue the way it was going at the end," Roglič
said.
"I was really bad and in a lot of pain. With the
normal stages it was too much for my body at the moment.
"I’m definitely disappointed, I didn't plan this to
be the way it is and you have to accept it. I have to go on with this decision.
I have to be optimistic, look to the future and new goals."
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