Primoz Roglič, Remco Evenepoel sparring in Catalunya sets tone for Giro d’Italia slugfest

This article originally appeared on Velo News

If Remco Evenepoel and Primoz Roglic are only sparring at Volta a Catalunya in preparation for the Giro d’Italia, the race for the maglia rosa looks set to be a slugfest this May.

The Catalan tour put Roglic and Evenepoel center stage in a series of sizzling mountain duels and bonus-point sprints that left the twosome almost inseparable.

It’s a GC match-up that tracks back through last year’s Itzulia Basque Country and Vuelta a Espana, and brings narratives of youth vs age, a new stage-race ace vs an established powerhouse, and so much more.

It’s a rivalry with all the promise of Tadej Pogacar and Jonas Vingegaard at the Tour de France, or Mathieu van der Poel and Wout van Aert everywhere else.

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“I think we’re showing that we're equally level and it will be a nice battle at the Giro d’Italia if we keep this shape,” Evenepoel said after another full-blooded bout Saturday. “But of course, some others will improve.”

Giro-bound grand tour warhorse Geraint Thomas saw the start of his season derailed by illness, leaving his teammate Tao Geoghegan Hart or UAE Team Emirates racer Joao Almeida as good bets for a spot on the final Italian podium.

But there seems no doubt that Roglic and Evenepoel have become pink jersey favorites six weeks out from the Grande Partenza.

After they scooped prestigious WorldTour wins at the UAE Tour and Tirreno-Adriatico respectively, Evenepoel and Roglic turned up in Catalunya looking for a final stage racing tune-up.

But just like how Pogacar and Vingegaard raced Paris-Nice, there’s no easy racing in the WorldTour.

“I’m testing myself,” Evenepoel said Saturday. “I've come from altitude, so I want to test how the legs are and race and improve toward the Giro. I feel I'm not 100 percent, I'm just in a good shape. There are still small details with weight etc I can look at to improve my shape.”

‘Riding against Remco is never boring’

A climbing deadlock on Lo Port amid a week of Catalan summit sprints brewed into a little on-road polemica Saturday when Roglic refused to cooperate in Evenepoel’s attempted stage-winning raid.

Evenepoel was seen shouting and gesticulating toward the Slovenian in a bid to get a pull as they charged into Molins de Rei. It’s an incident that was later downplayed but remains an encounter that adds a little depth to what looks set to become a rich Giro ragu in May.

“The end of the stage was a real show,” Roglic said Saturday. “Riding against Remco is never boring. We were expecting something, and we were on guard when he attacked.”

Roglic and Evenepoel will take the gloves off a while after Catalunya’s final circuit stage of Barcelona.

Roglic isn’t slated to race again before the Giro rolls out of the Abruzzo, while Evenepoel will only see a start line for Brabantse Pijl and his Liege-Bastogne-Liege defense.

Evenepoel branded Roglic - who, like him, has won the Vuelta, Liege, and a big bunch of time trials - as his “idol” Saturday.

It doesn’t look like there will be much hero-worshipping in Italy later this month.

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