‘I was always in search of the limit, also with mountain biking and jumping. I was never afraid of crashes’
Matej Mohorič would be a superb pub quiz teammate for the maths and science rounds, but don’t rely on him for any pro cycling history.
‘I don’t know anything. I got caught out a couple of times during my career,’ he says. ‘It’s not something I’m proud of, I just don’t have enough time. Or enough interest, because of the fact that I’m not super-emotional about the sport. I’m more rational about it. I see it as my profession.’
Take descending. It is often regarded as an art form, somewhere on the spectrum between God-given ability, instinct and experience. As a teenager in the Slovenian backcountry, Mohorič did his best to turn it into a scientific experiment: he rode into corners at different speeds, making a note of which one made his wheels lose grip. Risky research that gave him a tear or two in his shorts, maybe, but also invaluable wisdom and confidence.
‘I was always in search of the limit, also with mountain biking and jumping. I was never afraid of crashes, I always got up and did it again. It’s still like that now,’ he says.
He is a rare road racer who can threaten in every scenario apart from Grand Tour general classification assaults. He has the attributes to challenge for almost any Classic and is a top-five finisher in races as diverse as Paris-Roubaix, Liège-Bastogne-Liège and Milan-San Remo, where he came out on top to win in 2022.
Then there’s his lethal threat from-breaking domestique Filippo Simeoni in 2004. Would he change anything about it now?
