Despite being one of the overwhelming favourites, Primoz Roglic (LottoNL-Jumbo) will skip the individual time trial at the World Championships next month in order to focus on the road race. The decision follows a crash at the Tour de France that has prevented him from training on his time trial bike.
The UCI confirmed that Roglic would be absent from the individual time trial in Innsbruck, Austria with the rider explaining that a crash at last month's Tour de France has hindered his training strategy.
'I took the decision about 10 days ago because I had some problems with my elbow after the Tour de France. I had a stone it in after a crash, which I had removed,' stated Roglic.
'A week later it was inflamed so I had to have it opened up again. I still haven’t ridden my TT bike, so I can’t really train to get a good result.
'I will [only] start when I can fight for a win, so I won’t do it.'
This will come as a disappointment for the Slovenian considering the form he carried through the Tour, including victory on the 'Queen' stage and fourth on General Classification.
In many ways, Roglic surpassed expectations by managing to remain in contention for yellow across the entire three weeks at his first attempt.
This also means Roglic will give up the chance to defend his World Championships silver medal that he took 12 months ago in Bergen, Norway.
The 28-year-old will enter the road race, a 265km mountainous route around Innsbruck which includes 5,000m of elevation gain, a course that could suit the punchy climber.
'I will do the road race; it will be a challenge but I like it – it’s a really long race and a lot of things will happen for sure,' said Roglic.
'I’ve never really raced a World Championships [Road Race] for a result before and, like I said it will be a challenge.
'It’s a really hard course, especially the last climb. It will be a fight to go over it when we hit it for the last time. I rode it three times today and it was tough.'
Before heading to the Worlds, Roglic will race the Tour of Britain which starts this weekend. He will lead LottoNL-Jumbo who attempt to defend the overall title won by Lars Boom last year.
He will face stiff competition from the likes of Team Sky duo Geraint Thomas and Chris Froome who will also be on the start line in Pembury Country Park, Wales this Sunday.