How Do Roglič Fans Do It?
Primož Roglič has crashed in more ways than most pros dare to imagine. After another tumble at the Giro d’Italia, how do his fans keep the faith? A satirical ode to cycling’s most resilient fandom.
Ciao tifosi,
Today’s Giro time trial from Lucca to Pisa brought wet roads, tight corners, and, of course, a pre-race crash from Primož Roglič during recon. Just two days earlier, he’d hit the deck on the gravel stage and tumbled down to 10th in the GC. But in true Roglič fashion, he pulled it together when it mattered, delivering a gutsy ride that launched him back up to fifth overall.
It got me thinking: how do Roglič fans survive this emotional rollercoaster? Below, a short ode to the bravest hearts in cycling.
Enjoy,
–Rosael 💞
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Cycling’s Fall Guy: How Do Roglič Fans Keep the Faith?
There are many mysteries in professional cycling. Why do some races start inside shopping malls? How does Tadej Pogačar always look like he just rolled out of bed and onto the podium? And who keeps anonymously editing Mario Gianetti’s Wikipedia page? But none, to me, is more confounding than the sheer emotional endurance of Primož Roglič fans.
They are a loyal tribe. Earnest. Optimistic. Immune, it seems, to trauma.
I think of them often, usually when Roglič is on the ground.
This time, it was the morning of a Giro time trial—a recon ride, no less—when news filtered in: Roglič had crashed. Again. Nothing serious, Orla Chennaoui said on TV. Just a little tumble. A light tasting of Tuscan pavement, because Sunday’s sterrato wasn’t enough. He would start as planned, bandaged, resolute, undeterred, and even make up for time lost.
Of course, he would. Is the Leaning Tower of Pisa leaning? Has Roglič crashed? Some things are just constants in this world.
Here is a man who once made a career of defying gravity—a ski jumper by trade, a daredevil by instinct. He didn’t just flirt with gravity; he courted it recklessly, leapt into its arms. Now he races bikes, and gravity still won’t let him go.
He crashes in time trials and warm-ups. He crashes when no one else seems to be crashing. There is no malice in it, just inevitability, like your SRAM chain falling or Mercury in retrograde.
And yet, much like Roglič himself—like boxers who refuse to stay down—his fans persist. They rise with him, fall with him, and, perhaps most impressively, they never lose faith that one day he will get his shit together. (Neither does he, it would seem.)
I admire them. I fear for them. I want to wrap them in bubble wrap and ask—why? How?
How do they do it?
Do they keep a stress ball beside the remote? Do they light a candle each season for Saint Jude, patron of lost causes and persistent Slovenian stage racers? Do they cry out, Oh, Madonna del Ghisallo, shield him from himself, as he rolls down the start ramp?
Or do they know something I don’t? That in a sport this chaotic, a man who knows how to get up is worth just as much as one who never goes down.
Either way, I salute them. Because I couldn’t do it. Because to be a Roglič fan is to love a man in flight, even when he can’t resist kissing the ground.