After romping into the yellow jersey and taking the stage victory with it on day three of the Tour de France at Les Angles, Tadej Pogačar put up the unlikely theory that he might never win again.

While not a mathematical impossibility, the likelihood of that scenario looks vanishingly small, given the form that the UAE Team Emirates-XRG rider has shown over the past three days. While rival Jonas Vingegaard (Visma-Lease a Bike) may have swiped a popular yellow jersey on stage one, Pogačar was still fastest up the final climb. Yesterday he gifted the stage win to teammate Isaac Del Toro, before finally opting, as if at will, to take one for himself.

Plus ça change.

Pogacar's 'never win again' suggestion was mostly an attempt to fend off the question of whether he was eyeing up Mark Cavendish's 35-stage Tour de France win record – which would require 14 more to beat for the Slovenian.

"That's still quite far away," Pogačar said. "Maybe today was my last victory ever, so I prefer to stay in the moment… enjoy this victory. Every victory feels very special, and if we can have more moments like yesterday, I'll also be grateful.

"So far my career is already beyond my wildest imagination, so yeah, I don't want to think about Mark's record. Just go with the flow and see what we can do in the future, but yeah, if today is my last victory, I'm happy enough."

As if to underline the improbability of his 'last win' postulation, when asked whether he planned to build his form throughout the race, he said there was no form left to build.

"I think maybe this was in the past, like 20 years ago, when they were aiming that the shape will grow to the last week," he said. "But I think now these days you need to come with the best shape possible at the start of the Tour, and you go with it. You try every day to recover as much as possible, eat food like a robot, and just go with the flow with what you bring here."

Last win or not, Pogačar had planned for stage three to be a family affair, with his mother at the finish. However, due to wildfires in the region, a decree issued by the Pyrenees-Orientales department forbade fans from attending the race under threat of prosecution, so she opted to stay away.

"My mum messaged me in the morning, saying, 'Ah, we cannot come to see the stage today, because of the rules," he said.

But not everyone was keen on the restrictions, prosecution or not: "We came to 20km to go, and the top of the climb was full of people, which was, for me, nice," he added. "But yeah, a lot of people decided not to come but still many, many did. Only here in the final, I think, it was a bit less."

With the heat set to soar to 40 degrees plus for Tuesday's fourth stage from Carcassonne to Foix, and continued high heat lasting well into the race, today's ruling may not be the last of the Tour. But as they proved today that won't necessarily deter the fans. And if Pogačar's form remains as hot as the fry-an-egg tarmac of southern France, they're likely to see him win another stage too.

Tadej Pogačar sprang to victory on stage three of the Tour de France on Monday, taking the yellow jersey in the process.

Launched across the finish line by his UAE Team Emirates-XRG teammate, and yesterday’s stage winner Isaac del Toro, Pogačar took an impressive win on the ascent to Les Angles, securing a two-second gap over Jonas Vingegaard (Visma-Lease a Bike) The two GC rivals are now level, but as a result of count back, Pogačar now has the race lead and the maillot jaune.

Richard Carapaz took third place on a day when his EF Education–EasyPost teammate Alex Baudin led a spirited breakaway and took the KOM jersey.

During his post-ride interview, Pogačar was effusively complimentary about Del Toro, who put another massively impressive ride on a tough, long, hot and hilly stage.

"It’s because of him, it’s because of Isaac today, I got some extra power I think in the final," said the Slovenia. "He committed more than 100% in the final climb, all the team actually. In the middle of the stage we decided that it’s possible to go for the stage win, and I’m really happy that we start the Tour like this. An incredible finish today.

"If we can win like we won today, and the team feels super good, then we have to take the opportunity. We tried, we gave it all, and we won.

"To take the yellow jersey is a dream for any cyclist, of any age. For me, I don’t know which time already, but every time I can get it is really special. I don’t know for how long this will last, but we try to enjoy every moment."

On a day when most people expected a breakaway to prevail, it came down instead to a battle between the GC contenders during the final 10km, with very few spectators as the stage finished in France, but in an 'exceptional format', due to soaring heat and the heightened risk of wildfires.

The second-longest stage of this year's Tour had a tough and challenging parkour – not a mountain stage, but relentlessly lumpy, with lots of long climbs and a total of 3940 metres of altitude gain across the day, including an uphill finish.

The first third of the stage was ridden at a frenetic pace, with average speeds of 43km per hour despite the lumpy terrain and temperatures in the mid to late 30 degrees celsius. An early crash on the first climb took down multiple riders and left Bruno Armirail (Visma-Lease-a-bike) with a visibly injured right knee and a broken shoe.

With 125km to go, after one-and-a-half hours of relentless riding, the race seemed to settle and then 19 riders made a move. Of this group, Alex Baudin (EF Education-EasyPost) was best placed, with decent position in the GC and a vaguely realistic chance of moving into yellow if he could get the right support from riders around him.

Visma-Lease a Bike appeared almost content to let go of the yellow jersey for a stage and sat back, and UAE Team Emirates-XRG soon capitalised, significantly stepping up the pace and chasing the advance group down. The breakaway failed to establish enough of a gap and it was soon whittled down to six riders, with Nicolas Prodhomme (Decathlon CMA CGM), Vlad Van Mechelen (Bahrain Victorious), George Bennett (NSN Cycling), Raúl García Pierna (Movistar) and Mattéo Vercher (TotalEnergies) hanging in with Baudin.

Baudin mounted an attack during the second-last climb of day – the relatively gentle, but long, ascent of the Col du Calvaire, and fellow Frenchman Nicolas Prodhomme stuck with him. Baudin took the points at the top of the climb, and with it the KOM jersey, and stayed doggedly ahead of the peloton until 11.5km to go, but the UAE-led peloton was always going to reel him in.

This set the scene for an exciting finish, with all the GC contenders in the mix as the pack entered the final kilometre. Having seized control of the race, UAE Team Emirates-XRG were in a commanding position, and Del Toro launched Pogačar into the pole spot with 500 metres to go.

Results

Tour de France stage three: Granollers › Les Angles (195.9km)

1. Tadej Pogačar (Slo) UAE Team Emirates-XRG, in 4:45:11
2. Jonas Vingegaard (Den) Visma-Lease a Bike, +2s
3. Richard Carapaz (Ecu) EF Education-EasyPost
4. Paul Seixas (Fra) Decathlon CMA CGM, both at same time
5. Tobias Halland Johannessen (Nor) Uno-X Mobility, +4s
6. Lennert Van Eeetvelt (Bel) Lotto Intermarché
7. Florian Lipowitz (Ger) Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe
8. Remco Evenepoel (Bel) Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe
9. Isaac del Toro (Mex) UAE Team Emirates-XRG
10. Juan Ayuso (Esp) Lidl-Trek, all at same time

General classification after stage three

1. Tadej Pogačar (Slo) UAE Team Emirates-XRG, in 8:46:55
2. Jonas Vingegaard (Den) Visma-Lease a Bike, at same time
3. Remco Evenepoel (Bel) Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe, +23s
4. Isaac del Toro (Mex) UAE Team Emirates-XRG, +24s
5. Juan Ayuso (Esp) Lidl-Trek, +27s
6. Paul Seixas (Fra) Decathlon CMA CGM, +48s
7. Florian Lipowitz (Ger) Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe, +53s
8. Lenny Martinez (Fra) Bahrain Victorious, +1:09
9. Tobias Halland Johannessen (Nor) Uno-X Mobility, +1:11
10. Ilan Van Wilder (Bel) Soudal Quick-Step, +1:17

Defending Tour de France champion Tadej Pogačar goes into Stage 1's 19.6km team time trial on a new Colnago time trial bike, code-named the TT2. The Slovenian was spotted using it during the Tour de Romandie prologue in April already - no doubt a move to get some race-effort miles on it in preparations for July.

According to Colnago, complete bikes, including a solid-disc rear, can be built to the UCI weight limit of 6.8kg, which is an incredible feat. The TT2 is some 580g lighter than the model it replaces, with savings said to come from across the bike to improve stability and weight distribution and to aid performance on modern WorldTour TT courses and uphill finishes. Of course, it's faster, too, thanks to a new-fangled front end with a conventional steerer (no bayonet here) that is claimed to save 2 watts over the TT1 and cull weight.

The new bike is also bang-on trend to accommodate wider tyre clearances – up from 28mm to 30mm. Based on what we examined, that might be considered overkill, as Tadej's bike was fitted with 25mm Continental GP5000 TT TR tyres.

The bike is built with Shimano Dura-Ace Di2 components and adorned with Carbon-Ti trim here and there. Up front is a one-by-specific 64T Carbon-Ti chainring with an 11-30T cassette out back, driven by 160mm cranks – a balanced gearing configuration for the flats but something that will pose a notable challenge for the double-kick ascent up Montjuïc hill to the Olympic Stadium.

Despite the narrow-wide profiling of the Carbon-Ti chainring, Pogačar is using a UAE-branded K-Edge chainkeeper to ensure retention across all terrain types.

An interesting move was the fitment of 25mm Continental GP5000 TT TR tyres – the narrowest size we've seen across all the teams we visited at the Grand Depart weekend in Barcelona. Despite the 22mm internal rim width of the Enve SES Pro wheels, the tyres will - at the most - inflate to between 26-27mm, which suggests it's been employed as an aerodynamic move. UAE Team Emirates-XRG have also been running 28mm tyres on their Colnago Y1Rs and V5Rs road bikes, again an aerodynamic ploy, according to the mechanics.

Pog's Colnago TT2 rolls on a pair of Enve SES Pro wheels with a 100mm depth up front and a solid disc at the rear.

The touchpoints come compliments of Enve and Fizik. The Slovenian's cockpit is a custom one-piece Enve solution that mounts directly to the basebar via dual risers. For extra support, there's a bridge near the top that doubles as a Wahoo computer mount.

After parting ways with Prologo at the end of the 2024 season, UAE Team Emirates-XRG are now using Fizik saddles, with Tadej opting for the 192g 3D-printed Aeris 1.0 TT model.

We spotted some interesting hacks on the Colnago TT2. For hand retention during cornering, the base bar has grip tape mounted over a layer of black electrical tape – not the prettiest solution, but these rudimentary solutions have become part of the discipline.

Closer examination of the front end reveals an extra shifter button that has been hot-glued onto the Dura-Ace Di2 ST-R9180 STI TT brake levers. Given that these levers already have a remote shifter button, the extra shifter offers an alternative for shifting with the index finger rather than the thumb.

Other details worth noting are the gold Bikone ceramic bottom bracket, gold Carbon-Ti UDH-compatible dropout and axles, 140mm front/rear disc rotors, and Shimano Dura-Ace pedals. Sadly, no baby Hulk sticker was to be found.

Colnago TT2 bike specs

• Frameset: Colnago Carbon monocoque
• Fork: Colnago Carbon fork with 25mm steerer
• Cockpit: Custom Enve bar and extensions
• Seatpost: Colnago Aero
• Groupset: Shimano Dura-Ace Di2: 64T, 11-30T
• Wheelset: Enve SES Pro front, SES Disc Pro rear
• Tyres: Continental GP5000 TT TR 25mm
• Saddle: Fizik Aeris 1.0 TT

Brimming with energy and sporting a blonde-dyed buzzcut that will put paid to any ideas of tufty hair protruding from helmet vents, Tadej Pogačar addressed a packed Tour de France press room in Barcelona for a look ahead to the race.

Last in a series of big GC players to subject themselves to media questioning in the sumptuous surrounds of the city's Recinto Modernista, with the Sagrada Familia looking on just a block away, the UAE Team Emirates-XRG rider had his 'Pogačar' dialled up to 11 as he began by offering his smiley thanks to the media for turning up, flanked by team-mate Isaac Del Toro.

The questions went this way and that, with those asking them perhaps aware that the usual 'what are your hopes for the race?' and 'how's your form?' were somewhat redundant ('winning' and 'pretty amazing, thanks', presumably being the answers).

Asked about his rivals and in particular Jonas Vingegaard (Visma-Lease a Bike), Pogačar took the first of more than one opportunity to big up the young team-mate sitting beside him.

"I don't think [Vingegaard] is the only one that can come close. I think there's quite a few guys here that could push for the victory – this guy next to me…" he said, nodding towards a slightly embarrassed looking Del Toro.

"But competition between me and Jonas the last four years was spectacular, I would say. I think we push further to new heights every year," he said.

A certain amount was also made of his scant 2026 racing calendar – he has only raced 16 days up to now, but he said he was feeling, "pretty good. Only 16 days of racing, but the training kilometres also count, and there's been a lot."

Was racing fewer days helping him to enjoy it more, he was asked.

"I've enjoyed racing all my lifetime," he responded, batting the question away, "but I must say that maybe I even enjoy it more every year because I've stayed in the same team with the same riders and people around me, so every race I feel like I look forward to coming back with the teammates and staff. The race is also there, but mainly I enjoy just seeing the team and being around the guys."

The 27-year-old, who is gunning for a landmark fifth Tour de France win this year, was asked, too, about his pro cyclist girlfriend Urška Žigart, who broke her jaw in a crash in the recent Tour de Suisse. "Thank you for the thought," he offered, before explaining that she was healing fast and already riding outside, even if the doctors had advised against it. And he addressed, too, the €100,000 he donated to his home village of Komenda, which was hit by a storm last month, with roofs ripped off houses. "I think it's quite important to have a roof over your head," he said. "While I was growing up in Komenda, for me everything was perfect, all the neighbours, all the people there… It's my time to give back."

The Tour de France begins on Saturday with a team time trial, around a city that is already thrumming to the beat of the race, dripping in Tour de France Yellow. Pogačar will hope to be sporting that yellow too come Saturday night, and he left no doubt as to how much he was looking forward to it, giving local journalists the top line they had perhaps turned up for.

"I really like Barcelona. It's one of the coolest cities ever," he gushed, before quipping, "It would be better to be here for vacation. But yeah, I'm really looking forward to the Grand Départ here, and really excited to race around here and similar roads as in [the Volta a] Catalunya. I think we are in the same hotel as we were on stage one in Catalunya, so it's quite familiar."

And Pogačar in the race lead on Saturday? That might be more familiar still.

UAE Team Emirates-XRG have announced the seven riders that will support Tadej Pogačar as he defends his title at this year's Tour de France.

Isaac del Toro, Felix Großschartner, Brandon McNulty, Nils Politt, Florian Vermeersch, Tim Wellens, and Adam Yates will all join the Slovenian at the race, which begins this Saturday 4 July in Barcelona, Spain.

If Pogačar wins the yellow jersey, he will equal the all-time record, and join an exclusive club of five-time winners, alongside Jacques Anquetil, Eddy Merckx, Bernard Hinault and Miguel Induráin.

"The Tour de France is always the biggest challenge of the season and also the race that motivates us the most," Pogačar said in a statement. "Every year, you arrive at the start knowing that anything can happen over three weeks, and that’s what makes it so special.

"We’ve prepared really well as a team, everyone has worked incredibly hard, and now we’re excited to finally get started in Barcelona.

"I feel good, I’m looking forward to racing, and I know I’ll have a fantastic group of teammates and staff around me. We have a lot of confidence in each other and have built up a lot of experience together over the years."

Pogačar has never finished lower than second in six previous participations at the Tour. He won on debut in 2020, aged 21, when he dramatically overturned the GC in a penultimate day time trial to La Planche des Belles Filles.

The 27-year-old then went on to win in 2021, 2024 and 2025, finishing second to Jonas Vingegaard (Visma-Lease a Bike) in 2022 and 2023.

Del Toro is the only debutant in UAE Team Emirates-XRG's squad for this July's edition. The 22-year-old Mexican placed second on debut at the Giro d'Italia last season, winning 18 times throughout the year.

This season, both Del Toro and Pogačar have topped the GC at every stage race they have finished; Del Toro won the UAE Tour, Tirreno-Adriatico and the Tour Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes, while Pogačar won the Tour de Romandie and the Tour de Suisse.

"From a training perspective, I would say I'm stronger," Pogačar said of his form a week ago at the Tour de Suisse, speaking to L'Équipe.

Although the world champion has only completed 16 race days in 2026 so far, he has enjoyed one of his most successful season starts to date, winning three Monuments in Milan-San Remo, the Tour of Flanders and Liège-Bastogne-Liège.

The Tour de France opens with a team time trial in Barcelona on 4 July.

Looking ahead to the race, Pogačar said: "There will be strong rivals, difficult stages and many other unpredictable moments, but we’re ready to give everything."

Not since 1959 had the Tour de Suisse seen dominance like it did last week. The organisers had planned for a race, but instead they got an exhibition. On his debut appearance, Tadej Pogačar’s overall victory was crushing: he won by six minutes and 32 seconds, the race’s largest winning margin in 67 years, and in fewer stages – just five compared to the usual eight. Pogačar won three of them.

At times, it seemed effortless for the world champion. On stage one, he charged out of the peloton, like a seal swimming through a shoal of fish, to win with a 71km solo that earned him the race lead and a two-and-a-half-minute advantage.

Victories for Romain Grégoire (Groupama-FDJ United) and Jhonatan Narváez (UAE Team Emirates-XRG) then interrupted the Pogačar show, before regular programming resumed; he won stage four’s time trial by four hundredths of a second ahead of Mathieu van der Poel (Alpecin-Premier Tech), and then tagged and swallowed the escaped Lenny Martinez (Bahrain Victorious) on the final day to stamp the GC with a stage win. It was, in ice skating parlance, the final twirl at the end of a gold-medal-winning routine.

But what does it mean for the Tour de France? It’s now less than two weeks until the Grand Départ in Barcelona on 4 July. Pogačar hailed his sojourn in Switzerland as “really good preparation”, a chance to “test the legs, the heart, the lungs, everything”. Though he hasn’t shared the results of that self-assessed cardiogram, everything seems to be in fine working order – perhaps even better than ever. “I’m really looking forward to a whole month in France,” he told Cycling Pro Net with a confident grin.

Still, if the world champion’s on-bike performances weren’t a big enough warning sign for his Tour rivals, then a training tale he told L’Équipe last week certainly was. “On our camp [in Sierra Nevada], there’s a climb that I tested on last year,” he began. “I set a really good time, and I told myself, ‘Wow, I will never be able to go faster than that.’”

Pogačar returned to the unnamed climb at the end of his camp earlier this month. How did he fare? “I was significantly faster than last year,” he said. “From a training perspective, I would say I'm stronger.” It bears reminding that Pogačar won the Tour by four minutes and 24 seconds last year.

Pogačar’s approach to this year’s edition has been more refined. In a bid to arrive at the race fresher than any of his rivals, the Slovenian has done fewer race days than ever before, and to a near-perfect record too – he has collected 13 wins in just 16 starts.

Over the past six editions, he averaged 24 pre-Tour race days. Jonas Vingegaard (Visma-Lease a Bike), by comparison, has already completed 36 in 2026, mostly due to racing, and winning, the Giro d’Italia.

It’s hard to know at this stage which strategy is better. But if a reduced calendar stops Pogačar showing signs of burnout in the final week of the Tour – “I can’t wait for it to be over,” he said after his stage 18 press conference last year – then this winning formula may prove the most potent yet.

So roll on 4 July. Mark the day Pogačar will begin his bid to earn a record-equalling fifth Tour title, one that will bring him in line with Bernard Hinault, Miguel Induráin, Jacques Anquetil and Eddy Merckx.

Pogačar has previously branded comparisons between him and Merckx as “complete nonsense”. Forgive me, then, for drawing another parallel right now: just before Merckx won his fifth Tour de France in 1974, he made his debut at the Tour de Suisse, and topped the overall standings.

History could now repeat itself. And the Tour might see a level of dominance it hasn’t witnessed in decades.

A breakneck chase all the way to the line by Tadej Pogačar could not stop breakaway rider Romain Grégoire (Groupama-FDJ United) from sprinting to victory in Locarno on stage two of the men's Tour de Suisse.

The Frenchman was part of a 14-rider escape that dominated the day. With a brace of small but tricky climbs immediately preceding the finish the break split apart and was almost caught as Pogačar (UAE Team Emirates-XRG) and his fellow GC riders began their inevitable rampage.

But six riders held on to contest the win, with Pogačar, accompanied by Mathias Vacek (Lidl-Trek) and Afonso Eulálio (Bahrain Victorious), finishing just four seconds back. The Slovenian held on to his yellow jersey, and now leads EF Education-EasyPost's Richard Carapaz by 2:50, with Andrea Bagioli (Lidl-Trek) a further 17 seconds in arrears.

Afterwards Grégoire described the day as "really hard", and said that there was little he and his breakaway companions could do as Pogačar's trio ate up their lead from behind.

"We couldn't do anything," he said, "we were just full gas, we couldn't accelerate. We just had to wait and wish that he won't be able to come back. And finally it was [close] but we did it."

Today was the 23-year-old's second Tour de Suisse stage win – he took one last year too. It was a race that suited him, he said: "It's a race I like a lot – the [stage] profiles are really good for me and it's a moment of the year when I have good legs."

The 157.7km stage started and finished in Locarno, and featured the same double-climb finish as the stage two of the Tour de Suisse Women, which was held this morning and won by Elisa Longo Borghini (UAE Team ADQ). Just like the women's race the final quarter of the men's stage was an all-action affair in which numerous protagonists knocked seven bells out of each other without relent.

Up until then the race had been set steady, with a 14-rider break maintaining a small gap for much of the day. It was a solid looking group, featuring among others Bauke Mollema (Lidl-Trek), Julan Alaphilippe (Tudor Pro Cycling), Giro d'Italia star Afonso Eulálio (Bahrain Victorious), Fred Wright (Pinarello-Q36.5) and of course Grégoire.

As the first of the back-to-back climbs approached, the break was all together and more than two minutes ahead. But with UAE Team Emirates-XRG stepping up the pace behind, the gap began to fall. By the time the 3.5km ascent was crested, the peloton had been strung out to breaking point, led by Pogačar, teammate Jhonatan Narvaez, and Vacek, the breakaway had split in two, and its lead had been halved.

After a short descent the race hit the steep, 1.4km slopes of the Via Consiglio Mezzano. With the reduced breakaway pounding the pedals ahead, shedding riders here and there, Pogačar attempted to launch Narvaez for the stage win. But it was without success: the Ecuadorian blew up. And so the Slovenian did what any win-hungry champion would do – attacked himself.

With Vacek somehow holding on, the pair picked up breakaway dropout Eulálio as they sliced into the time gap of the leaders. All of the front runners stayed upright down a technical urban descent and then it was into the centre of Locarno, wide roads giving hunters a glimpse of quarry, quarry a glimpse of hunters.

Going into the final kilometre the gap was just 10 seconds and the result hung in the balance. But the leaders had enough in the tank, and enough will to win, to pull off one final surge to the line, from which Grégoire walked away with the spoils.

ResultTour de Suisse, stage 2Locarno > Locarno, 157.7km

1. Romain Grégoire (Fra) Groupama-FDJ United, 157.7km in 3:26:25
2. Marcel Camprubí (Spa) Pinarello-Q36.5
3. Bart Lemmen (Ned) Visma-Lease a Bike
4. Filippo Zana (Ita) Soudal Quick-Step, all s.t.
5. Finlay Pickering (Gbr) Jayco AlUla, +2s
6. Mathias Vacek (Cze) Lidl-Trek, +4s
7. Emiel Verstrynge (Bel) Alpecin-Premier Tech
8. Tadej Pogačar (Slo) UAE Team Emirates-XRG, both s.t.
9. Afonso Eulálio (Por) Bahrain Victorious, +9s
10. Jhonatan Narvaez (Ecu) UAE Team Emirates-XRG, +32s

General Classification after stage 2

1. Tadej Pogačar (Slo) UAE Team Emirates-XRG, in 6:55:02
2. Richard Carapaz (Ecu) EF Education-EasyPost, +2:50
3. Andrea Bagioli (Ita) Lidl-Trek, +3:07
4. Mathias Vacek (Cze) Lidl-Trek, +4:16
5. Finlay Pickering (Gbr) Jayco AlUla, +4:41
6. Ilan van Wilder (Bel) Soudal Quick-Step, +4:44
7. Brandon McNulty (USA) UAE Team Emirates-XRG
8. Wilco Kelderman (Ned) Visma-Lease a Bike, at s.t.
9. Matthew Riccitello (USA) Decathlon CMA CGM, +5:11
10. Jhonatan Narvaez (Ecu) UAE Team Emirates-XRG, +5:12

Tadej Pogačar made a 70km solo attack look like a coffee ride on Wednesday, when he sailed to victory on stage one of the Tour de Suisse.

The world champion peeled off the front of the peloton on an uncategorised climb, set up by his UAE Team Emirates-XRG team-mate Brandon McNulty, with 71.7km to go. He then stretched out his advantage to more than two minutes to claim the leader’s jersey and his tenth win of the season.

Richard Carapaz (EF Education-EasyPost) finished second, Andrea Bagioli (Lidl-Trek) third.

"This was definitely not the plan, but somehow it worked, thanks to my team-mates, I think," Pogačar said afterwards. "Without them blocking at the back, setting the pace before, this wouldn’t be possible.”

At points, Pogačar seemed almost confused by how effortlessly he drew the gap out. He checked regularly over his shoulder, perhaps expecting to see a group in pursuit, but all he saw was open road.

"I didn’t have a radio [at the time of the attack], so I didn’t know what was going on in the back, so I just kept riding hard," he said.

"Once I knew the gap was quite big, I could settle into the rhythm and try to hold it to the finish, which was super long and really hard, but was also, at the same time, quite technical, so it was really nice to be alone.”

The victory, and the seemingly offhand nature of it, sent a warning message to Pogačar’s rivals at next month's Tour de France: this is a rider who can win at will, and with ease. He has now collected 10 victories in just 12 race days this season, the lion’s share coming at May’s Tour de Romandie, his last race, where he won four stages and the general classification.

This year’s Tour de Suisse has been reduced from eight stages to five, bringing it in line with the women’s race, which is taking place concurrently. Visma-Lease a Bike’s Femke de Vries won stage one on Wednesday morning.

The opening stage of the men’s race took place entirely in northern Italy, on a thin loop tracing the Adda river, starting and finishing in Sondrio.

Uno-X’s Fredrik Dversnes began the day with a solo jaunt. That ended when the Norwegian was tagged and passed by Pogačar, who rode away comfortably, like Godzilla destroying a city, then wondering where all the rubble came from.

It would take another 20km before a rider dared to chase the world champion. Carapaz, whether he believed he could catch him or not, sprung out of the chase group, where Pogačar's lieutenants Felix Großschartner, Jhonatan Narváez, and Brandon McNulty patrolled the pack.

The Ecuadorian went on to earn second place for his effort, but not without the fright of Bagioli behind him, who finished just 15 seconds adrift. The rest of the GC favourites, including Primož Roglič (Red-Bull-Bora-hansgrohe) and Matthew Riccitello (Decathlon CMA CGM), all lost more than four minutes to Pogačar.

Thursday's second stage of the Tour de Suisse will see the race return to Switzerland, on an undulating route out of and back into Locarno.

Asked for his plan for the day, Pogačar said: “Stay safe and keep the jersey. We have a strong team, so we can try and go for the stage with Jonny, Brandon, Felix or anybody else. We’ll see how the guys feel.”

Results

Tour de Suisse 2026, stage one: Sondrio > Sondrio (144km)

1. Tadej Pogačar (Slo) UAE Team Emirates-XRG, in 3:28:51
2. Richard Carapaz (Ecu) EF Education-EasyPost, +2:14
3. Andrea Bagioli (Ita) Lidl-Trek, +2:29
4. Ilan Van Wilder (Bel) Soudal Quick-Step, +4:02
5. Mathias Vacek (Cze) Lidl-Trek
6. Brandon McNulty (USA) UAE Team Emirates-XRG
7. Wilco Kelderman (Ned) Visma-Lease a Bike, all at same time
8. Felix Großschartner (Aut) UAE Team Emirates-XRG, +4:05
9. AJ August (Netcompany-Ineos), +4:30
10. Jhonatan Narváez (Ecu) UAE Team Emirates-XRG, at same time

General classification after stage one

1. Tadej Pogačar (Slo) UAE Team Emirates-XRG, in 3:28:51
2. Richard Carapaz (Ecu) EF Education-EasyPost, +2:22
3. Andrea Bagioli (Ita) Lidl-Trek, +2:39
4. Ilan Van Wilder (Bel) Soudal Quick-Step, +4:16
5. Mathias Vacek (Cze) Lidl-Trek
6. Brandon McNulty (USA) UAE Team Emirates-XRG
7. Wilco Kelderman (Ned) Visma-Lease a Bike, all at same time
8. Felix Großschartner (Aut) UAE Team Emirates-XRG, +4:18
9. Matthew Riccitello (USA) Decathlon CMA CGM, +4:43
10. AJ August (Netcompany-Ineos), +4:44

The Giro-Tour double has long been one of cycling’s most coveted achievements. Winning two Grand Tours in one year is a sign of a rider's dominance, and unsurprisingly the list of those who have achieved it is a list of the greatest cyclists of all time. Eight male riders have managed to win both the Giro d'Italia and Tour de France in one season, and one female rider, although that is a list that could grow longer thanks to the date change for the women's Giro.

The first rider to achieve the feat was the great Fausto Coppi. The Italian was an icon, famed for his movie star good looks, and the first rider to dominate the sport and win races across Europe. The last rider to win both was Tadej Pogačar, and now his rival Jonas Vingegaard will attempt it in 2026. Starting the Giro for the first time, the Dane is the stand out favourite of all the GC contenders and will go on to ride the Tour de France in July.

Since the turn of the century the Giro/Tour double had been considered impossible in modern cycling, as the likes of Alberto Contador and Chris Froome - the two best GC riders of their generation with multiple wins between them - both failed to do it during their careers.

Although Froome did do the Tour/Vuelta double in 2017, and in 2018 won the Giro, meaning he held all three Grand Tour titles at the same time. Weeks later he finished third in the 2018 Tour behind team mate Geraint Thomas and Dutchman Tom Dumoulin.

The difficulty of winning both is in part down to the time in between the two races. Just the month of June separates them, and while this is plenty of time for a rider to recover, the challenge is for a rider to maintain their form from the beginning of May through to the end of July. Any rider attempting the Giro/Tour double knows that just one bad day out of 42 race days can end their attempt.

*Completed the Triple Crown by also winning the UCI road race World Championships

Annemiek van Vleuten became the first woman to win the Giro/Tour double in 2022, although this list of one is not through a lack of female riders good enough to do it, but through a lack of opportunity. The Tour de France Femmes avec Zwift returned to the women's calendar in 2022 after a decade long campaign, and even then, the dates weren't helpful.

That year the ten-day Giro d'Italia Donne finished on July 10 and the Tour de France Femmes began just 14 days later on July 24. Van Vleuten was however more than capable in a year where she barely finished outside of the top five in every race she started. To make her achievement even more impressive, she won the Madrid Challenge by La Vuelta in mid September. Although at the time, the women's third Grand Tour was only five stages long.

This year the Giro d'Italia Women has moved and will start on May 30th, and finish on June 7th, giving riders eight weeks between the two races. This should mean the top GC riders in the women's peloton will ride both, giving more riders the chance to add their name to the list. Demi Vollering has already stated her 2026 aim is to complete the double.

Male riders who have achieved the Giro / Tour double

Fausto Coppi

'Il Campionissimo' needs no introduction. Fausto Coppi is one of the most iconic and legendary cyclists of all time and, long after his untimely death, his name still carries a mythical status in the sport given his extensive list of achievements during his career.

Coppi was the first rider to ever win the Giro/Tour double, and ended up winning both races in the same year on two different occasions.

The first occasion was in 1949 while riding for the Italian national team. Coppi initially sustained a huge time deficit in the Tour after crashing heavily in the earlier stages, but he would go on to claw the time back in the high mountains as the race progressed.

He went on to win the race’s penultimate day time trial in Nancy which ensured that he would triumph at the Tour, on debut, and become the first rider to achieve the Giro-Tour double in the same season in the process, a feat he would go on to match three years later.

Jacques Anquetil  

Five Tour victories and two Giro triumphs make up just part of the great Jacques Anquetil’s list of achievements, but 1964 was arguably the Normandy-born rider’s crowning moment of his career.

Anquetil had already won the Giro previously in 1960, but going into the Italian Grand Tour that year he was among a select group of foreign hopefuls for the maglia rosa who all had the potential to upset the home support looking to witness an Italian triumph in their own backyard.

Riding for the Saint-Raphaël team that eventually inspired the well known kit brand Rapha, Anquetil took a stage win early on which saw him pull on pink before holding it all the way through to the finish.

A few weeks later at the Tour, Anquetil was very nearly denied his fifth Tour victory by Raymond Poulidor, who pushed him all the way to the end, cutting Anquetil’s lead to almost nothing. But Anquetil would eventually prevail, beating Poulidor in the race’s final time trial to ensure that he would win his fifth and final Tour de France by 55 seconds and achieve the double.

Eddy Merckx

Eddy Merckx holds the record for the most Giro/Tour doubles achieved during his career, an achievement truly befitting of a man nicknamed the Cannibal.

The Belgian great first pulled off the double in 1970, before going on to add a second and third in 1972 and 1974. His first Giro d’Italia was arguably unexpected after he had suffered with a knee injury for much of the race and illness beforehand.

However, after winning stage two, Merckx then went on to win three more stages as his fitness developed during the race. He then won a second successive Tour de France later that summer. Merckx then held off several challenges in 1972 at the Tour from France’s Raymond Poulidor and Felice Gimondi of Italy in order to ensure that he landed yet another double. Merckx’s eventual winning margin stood at more than ten minutes.

Merckx’s 1974 Giro win was a closely run affair. The Belgian won the Corsa Rosa by just 12 seconds that year and was made to wait until stage 12 for his first victory of the race, a 25 mile individual time trial on stage 12. He then won the Tour by 8:04 ahead of Poulidor.

Bernard Hinault

'The Badger' is the next man to have completed the double on more than one occasion, winning both the Giro and Tour in 1982 and 1985. Remarkably, the French legend won nearly all of the Grand Tours he ever participated in.

During his career, he competed in three editions of the Giro and two editions of the Vuelta a España, winning all five races. Hinault also won on five out of eight appearances at the Tour de France, making him part of a select club of riders to have won the Tour on five occasions.

The 1982 Tour saw Hinault take four stages on his way to victory in Paris. Three of those were individual time trials, one being the race’s prologue in Basel, before he then went on to win the race’s final stage in Paris on the Champs-Élysées.

Three years later, the Tour was a much more closely run affair. Hinault only managed two stage wins - both coming in time trials once again, before going on to win the race overall by 1:42 ahead of his La Vie Claire teammate, Greg LeMond.

Stephen Roche

Stephen Roche is one of only two former pro cyclists to achieve the unthinkable, winning cycling’s triple crown - the Giro d’Italia, Tour de France and road World Championships - all in the same season.

The Irishman only won the Tour on one occasion, but coming in the middle of his triple crown, it shouldn’t be underestimated. Interestingly Roche has previously said that it was never the plan to win all three events in the same year, everything just seemed to fall into place at the right time to enable him to do so.

Roche took the pink jersey during part b of the race’s first stage, a short individual time trial from the Poggio near San Remo into the middle of the town. The second part of the stage was a mere five kilometres in length, but that didn’t prevent Roche from laying down the law and claiming pink. Roche then won the final day longer time trial into Turin to wrap up the overall victory by more than three minutes.

Later that year, Roche was pushed all the way to the penultimate day time trial by Pedro Delgado during the Tour. Roche won an 87km time trial on stage ten before he then lost the yellow jersey with the end in sight. The Irishman clawed back enough time during the penultimate stage to pull on yellow once more ahead of the race wrapping up in Paris.

Miguel Induráin

Induráin is the only man to have ever completed the double in two consecutive seasons, winning both the Tour and Giro in 1992 and 1993. The Spaniard also won the Tour five years in a row with his time trialling prowess setting him well on the way to victory in each.

During his first Giro triumph, it was two time trial wins that got him over the line, including a 41 mile effort into Milan on the race’s final day.

Induráin then won all three of the Tour’s time trials later that year before eventually claiming yellow in Paris. He then replicated that accomplishment the following year, winning all four of the time trials on offer across both Grand Tours on his way to overall victory in each.

On retirement, Induráin’s stage win total stood at 16 in both the Giro and Tour with most of those being on aero bars. As well as his wins in both Italy and France, his time trial mastery also saw him claim the world title in 1995, before going on to land an Olympic gold medal in the discipline a year later.

Marco Pantani

Marco Pantani is possibly one of the most written about cyclists of all time, mainly due to his troubled private life which culminated in his tragic and untimely death in 2004 aged just 34.

In his prime, Pantani was regarded as being one of the sport’s very best climbers, with the sight of him dancing up the slopes of some of cycling’s most iconic peaks on his celeste blue Bianchi being a joy to behold. He was also well known for his pirate bandana and earring which he sported throughout his career, earning him the nickname 'Il Pirata'.

Prior to Pogačar’s victory, Pantani was the last man to complete the Giro/Tour double in 1998. In May that year, the boy from Cesenatico got his Giro off to a slow start as he shipped time in the early stages. But once his favoured terrain arrived, Pantani put the hammer down and soon had his rivals begging for mercy. Two mountain top stage wins at Piancavallo and Montecampione helped the Pirate eventually land the pink jersey in Milan.

Two months later the Tour began in Ireland with Chris Boardman winning the prologue and pulling on yellow. Pantani had to wait until stage 11 to Plateau de Beille to make his mark. The Italian obliterated his rivals to win the stage and set a record time for the ascent in the process. He was made to wait before he could pull on the yellow jersey, but victory on stage 15 at Les Deux Alpes, when leader Jan Ullrich suffered in the cold and rain through the mountains, was enough to see Pantani take the leader’s jersey and eventually win the Tour.

Controversy dogged the race that year, with the Festina doping scandal threatening to discredit the entire sport. Use of EPO was rife - Pantani was kicked off the 1999 Giro for having a high haematocrit (a measure used before a test for EPO was developed) - and the UCI was scrambling to keep up with the cheats. Rider protests threatened the Tour's very existence and many teams and riders were kicked out, or pulled themselves out. All of which left a cloud over Pantani's win.

Tadej Pogačar

It says everything about the Slovenian that he made the impossible look decidedly straight forward in 2024. Having already won Strade Bianche, the Tour of Catalunya, and Liège-Bastogne-Liège he breezed through the Giro d'Italia winning by nine minutes and 56 seconds (the biggest winning margin since 1965) from Daniel Martínez (Bora Hansgrohe), having worn the leaders pink jersey from stage two, taking six stage victories on the way and seemingly taking his foot off the gas in the final stages with his Tour challenge already in mind.

His Tour win was almost as dominant. He beat Jonas Vingegaard, who had won the previous two editions, by six minutes 17 seconds, took the yellow jersey on stage two, relinquished it on stage three only to win it back on stage four and wear it until the finish in Nice. And take six stages along the way.

Even though Vingegaard had a disrupted build up thanks to being caught up in a horrorific crash at the Tour of the Basque country that spring, Pogačar was clearly unbeatable. He then went on to become the third male rider in history to achieve the triple crown - winning the Giro, Tour and UCI road race world title in the same year. The latter with a jaw-dropping 101km break away.

He did however sit out the Paris Olympics that started just one week after the Tour, citing exhaustion. He also won the GP Cycliste de Montréal, Giro dell'Emilia and Il Lombardia before and after the world championships.

Female riders who have achieved the Giro / Tour double

Annemiek van Vleuten

Van Vleuten has won the Giro Donne on four occasions, but it was in 2022 that she won both the Giro and the Tour de France Femmes in the same year. She may not have won two three-week Grand Tours with just a month off in between, but she beat some formidable opposition on the way to her two victories. It is as good as you can get in women's cycling.

Looking at her Tour win in particular, she put the likes of Demi Vollering and Elisa Longo Borghini to the sword on the way to victory in the race’s inaugural edition, a landmark achievement for women’s cycling.

It was on stage three of the Giro that the Dutchwoman took her the first step towards her third overall victory. Van Vleuten won a hilly stage on a circuit around Cesena before going on to win in the mountains around Aldeno on stage seven which was enough to get the job done and secure the overall title.

During the Tour she had to leave it late to snatch the yellow jersey. Marianne Vos held the overall lead going into the final two mountain stages, but Van Vleuten wrestled it from her shoulders by taking wins at Le Markstein and Planche des Belles Filles.

Van Vleuten’s palmarès also matches any male rider on this list, particularly due to her four world titles and Olympic gold medal. She was simply a force to be reckoned with during her career and as a result, she thoroughly deserves her place alongside Pogačar, Merckx and company as a true winner of the Giro-Tour double.

Tadej Pogačar proved that he can just about win in any situation on Thursday as he won stage two of the Tour of Romandie in a reduced bunch sprint.

The UAE Team Emirates-XRG rider was part of a significant 32-rider group which made it to the finish after a lumpy stage and timed his sprint to perfection to beat Dorian Godon (Ineos Grenadiers). Finn Fisher-Black (Red Bull-Bora-hansgrohe) finished third.

He had survived as riders put in attacks on the final climb, including from Florian Lipowitz (Red Bull-Bora-hansgrohe).

It was the second victory in a row for Pogačar, who extended his lead in the yellow jersey as a result. Three stages remain of the race, with the odds of the Slovenian winning every stage now shortened. While Pogačar winning a sprint seems remarkable, it was a front group made up of mostly climbers, in a race almost without any sprinters of not, apart from Godon, who was beaten into second.

"We knew the final lap, we did it three times, and I knew the sprint was going to be tough because of the climbs before," Pogačar said on TV post-stage. "It was indeed, a super-fast climb with a tailwind. The sprint was pretty much headwind and quite downhill, so you couldn't be too much in front. I was, the last corner, too much in front, and suddenly some guys came, and they were too early, and that was an advantage for me."

Asked if the final climb of Vuillens, which they had ascended thrice, was decisive, he said: "To make the difference in time gaps no, but it makes the difference in the legs. If you go over the limit then for sure it's hard to do a good sprint. Luckily for me it was under control and I could still do a good sprint."

No collaboration? No problem. Tadej Pogačar made it look easy on stage one of the Tour de Romandie, outsprinting his three breakaway rivals despite having to do much of the work in the closing stages of the 171km stage, based on Martigny.

Pogačar (UAE Team Emirates-XRG) attacked with 39km to go on the day's big climb of Ovronnaz, which the riders crested with 22km of the stage to go. A break was formed with Lenny Martinez (Bahrain Victorious), Florian Lipowitz (Red Bull-Bora-hansgrohe) and, eventually, Jørgen Nordhagen (Visma-Lease a Bike).

Apparently content to hang with his fellow escapees over the climb, Pogačar took on much of the responsibility of driving the break all the way to the finish, before winning the sprint by several bike lengths.

The Slovenian now takes over the lead from Dorian Godon (Ineos Grenadiers).

Speaking after the race, Pogačar said: "I did not plan anything, but it was nice to take the win against youngsters. It was a really nice race, a really quick day and I was happy with the win in the sprint."

Asked about his decision not to attack the break on the climb, he said he was happy to benefit from the help of his fellow riders, though remarked pointedly on the decision of Lipowitz – who had team-mate Primož Roglič chasing behind – not to contribute.

"The last 22k was headwind... to try to do something would be very stupid. I was happy to have two young, eager guys to pull with me. They did a super good job, they were very strong. We managed to stay in front which was still difficult with only three, and one guy sitting in the wheels it's always harder to stay in front."

Speaking about his own team and their GC aspirations, Pogačar added: "It was all on us all day. The team did a super good job, so also for that I'm super happy to take the yellow. We will try to defend it every stage. They say the best defence is to attack, so we will see how we approach the next days."

With all of yesterday's top 10 losing time, the GC was rewritten, with the breakaway taking the first slots, and riders including Roglič (6th) and Antonio Tiberi (Bahrain Victorious, 7th) also present.

Results to follow...

Tour de Romandie stage 1: Martigny > Martigny, 171km

1. Tadej Pogačar (Slo) UAE Team Emirates-XRG, 171km in 3:56:55
2. Florian Lipowitz (Ger) Red Bull-Bora-hansgrohe
3. Lenny Martinez (Fra) Bahrain Victorious
4. Jørgen Nordhagen (Nor) Visma-Lease a Bike
5. Albert Withen Philipsen (Den) Lidl-Trek, +21s
6. Sergio Higuita (Col) XDS-Astana
7. Antonio Tiberi (Ita) Bahrain Victorious
8. Junior Lecerf (Bel) Soudal Quick-Step
9. Luke Plapp (Aus) Jayco-AlUla
10. Jefferson Alveiro Cepeda (Ecu) Movistar, all at same time

GC after stage 1

1. Tadej Pogačar (Slo) UAE Team Emirates-XRG, in 4:00:27
2. Florian Lipowitz (Ger) Red Bull-Bora-hansgrohe, +7s
3. Lenny Martinez (Fra) Bahrain Victorious, +16s
4. Jørgen Nordhagen (Nor) Visma-Lease a Bike, +23s
5. Albert Withen Philipsen (Den) Lidl-Trek, +31s
6. Primož Roglič (Slo) Red Bull-Bora-hansgrohe, +32s
7. Antonio Tiberi (Ita) Bahrain Victorious, +41s
8. Carlos Rodríguez (Spa) Ineos Grenadiers
9. Luke Plapp (Aus) Jayco-AlUla, all at same time
10. Luke Tuckwell (Aus) Red Bull-Bora-hansgrohe, +42s

Many lines of copy have been written about French teen sensation Paul Seixas (Decathlon CMA CGM) over the past few months – much of it predicting world domination at some point in the future. While the sceptics might be tempted to brush those predictions off as so much media hype, it's worth pointing out that the media is not alone.

Tadej Pogačar is the latest to throw his hat into the Seixas cheerleading ring, following a Liège-Bastogne-Liège on Sunday in which he was pushed all the way by the young Frenchman, with Pogačar eventually dropping Seixas on the final climb.

He said he expected Seixas to continue improving until he eventually "destroys everybody" – although it feels as though he has the measure of just about everybody already, the Slovenian excepted.

"Having Paul entering such a big field at such a good level already at 19, it brings motivation to everybody else now to keep trying to improve," said Pogacar, as reported by France24. "Because, again, he's 19 now and normally your body physically is the best at 26 to 30 years old.

"So, we'll see. We keep working hard to still try to fight for the next years to win as much as we can until he destroys everybody!"

In turn Seixas poured praise on Pogačar, calling him "the greatest rider of all time". Asked what he needed to do to beat him, he said: "Power! That seems obvious," said Seixas. "I just have to improve but we can see his level, it's extremely difficult to follow him. He's the greatest rider of all time."

He added: "There's more work to do but that's normal. You can't skip the steps so we'll just be satisfied with that today," he said of his runner-up place in the Ardennes Monument.

Liège was not the first time that Pogačar and Seixas have gone toe to toe at the end of a major hilly race this season. At Strade Bianche, Seixas was the last to be dropped by Pogačar before he embarked on what turned out to be 79km solo break to win. The French rider then went on to better Pogačar's team-mate Isaac Del Toro in the run-in to Siena.

Liège saw Seixas fare even better, hanging with the Slovenian after he attacked on La Redoute at 35km to go, and only meeting his match on the final climb, the Roche aux Faucons, with 14km to the line.

It grew from a rumble, a low chorus of a group in suspense. Wout van Aert was on Pogačar’s wheel in the Roubaix velodrome and people weren’t daring to hope - yet. Another few turns of the pedals and Van Aert was pushing ahead of Pogačar. The crowd roared.

But this chorus of joy wasn't playing out in Northern France, or in a small bar in Flanders. I’d just walked into Herne Hill Velodrome’s club room in South London with three precious minutes of race time left, and the atmosphere was electric.

Riders in multicoloured jerseys and cycling caps crossed with team names cluttered the room, all eyes trained on the small TV in front of them. The coffee machine whirred somewhere just behind the action, as time trial taster sessions rolled around the velodrome outside. Emily Stainer was, for the first time all afternoon, released from coffee-making duty as the crowd locked into the most exciting racing of the year so far.

"Everyone was on [van Aert's] side - it was super, super intense in the room,” Stainer recalled, proof of the Belgian's enduring popularity. “And then he suddenly went for it.”

“It was all drama, wasn't it?” CJ said, sat just across the room from where Stainer stood watching. “Van der Poel trying to drag himself back after his two punctures on the Arenberg. There were punctures and mechanicals everywhere, people falling off here, there and everywhere.”

CJ was recovering from a cobble ride they had - along with the rest of the captivated room - finished earlier that day. The Cobblemonster ride had started out on Sunday morning from UpCYCLE in Brixton, and headed north-west, ‘blasting across some early secteurs of the smoke’s Victorian pave before tucking into the east end and its myriad lanes of snaking cobbled nadgery,’ before ending back in Herne Hill for a victory lap of the velodrome in true Roubaix-style.' All according to the website.

“The cobbles, by the way, are excellent in London,” CJ said. To demonstrate their point, they compared them to the giant cobbles in Belgium: “The first set of cobbles that I saw, I burst out laughing. They are so big that you just bounce all over the place. It's uncontrollable. You have to go as fast as you can, so that you don't hit every single cobble. So when the pro riders are doing it, they hit like one cobble in 20, because they're so fast. But because I'm not very fast, I’m bouncing all over the place.” Luckily for CJ and the Cobblemonster riders, “the London cobbles are much more manageable. They're fairly small.”

The best cobbles CJ has ridden in the capital so far criss-cross the city. There’s a stretch in Farringdon and a load around the Docklands, as well as “a really long section down Wapping High Street.” The Cobblemonster tries its best to capture as many of the city’s cobbles as possible, with each edition offering a fresh treasure trove of hidden routes.

The ride finished at Herne Hill Velodrome, in time to catch the men’s Paris-Roubaix race - but not before the group did their own velodrome-finish. Unbeknownst to CJ, their final straight was about to imitate Van Aert’s own victory-lap, as their friend hung to their wheel only to overtake with metres left to sprint.

What is it about Paris-Roubaix that makes it such a special race, I asked Stainer, herself new to the world of professional racing. “Me and my friend were watching the Tour of Flanders the other week, and we were just like, well, this is going to be really boring, because it was basically decided who's going to win with an hour to go,” she said. “It felt like we couldn’t get excited about it.” Roubaix, on the other hand has a roster of underdog-victors, from Mathew Hayman to Johan Vansummeren.

Herne Hill Velodrome is a particularly special place to watch Paris-Roubaix. It is, after all, the home of VC Londres, Fred Wright’s first club. Though he finished 132nd this year, hopes had been high after finishing 9th last year. The 454 metre velodrome was where he first competed, in the track league alongside his dad as a kid, and where fans and family still come out to cheer him on, whether he’s riding on the track outside or beamed into the telly.

Maybe it was the collective post-ride high that gave the room such a buzz on Sunday, maybe it was the objective thrill of Paris-Roubaix, its unique capacity to produce race-long drama, maybe it was the fact that everyone was experiencing the race together - everyone in that room locked into the same drama. It was, if nothing more, a reminder of the importance of third spaces, where people can come together to celebrate and to share.

The only improvement to the day would have been more women in the crowd, a feeling CJ shared too, stressing the accessibility of an event like the Cobblemonster - no matter how alarming its name. "You always find that there's more blokes going to these things," they said. "[Other riders] might look at the distance and think, Oh, that's a long way. But it's such a chilled, relaxed ride."

But back in Herne Hill, Van Aert had won and I'd entered the pavilion just in time to witness the wall of sound that seemed to shift him across the line. Then as quick as the silence turned into screaming, chairs were scraped away, the telly switched off (before the women’s race could be streamed) and all trace of the day's event cleared to make way for the children’s birthday party about to head through the double doors.

'The Hell of the North leads to paradise'. That is the title that new Paris-Roubaix champion Wout van Aert gave to the Strava activity he posted up for the race, although he wrote it in French: 'L'Enfer du Nord mène au paradis'.

Next to it the Belgian added a pair of emojis – a finger pointing skyward, and a champion's cup. The former is a replication of the Visma-Lease a Bike rider's winning gesture, in which he remembered his Verandas Willems team-mate Michael Goolaerts, who passed away during the 2018 edition.

Unsurprisingly, Van Aert's Strava entry is paired with that of runner-up Tadej Pogačar (UAE Team Emirates-XRG), whose attacks the Belgian spent much of the sharp end of the race fending off. In Pogačar's case, his weary lack of jubilation is written all over the rather more prosaic entry title – 'Cycling'.

'Tadej Pogačar Pogi rode with Wout van Aert', Strava tells us, as if the pair had popped out for a bit of lunch time fresh air, rather than made history in one of the world's most revered bike races.

Strava credits Van Aert with numerous KoMs on the way to victory, including the rarely-used Briastre sector, the Wandignies sector (covered at 52kph, no less), and the mammoth Sector 17 [Hornaing] to Roubaix – 80km covered in 1hr 47min.

There was also a string of PRs, reflecting an incredible record average speed for the race of 48.9kph (30.4mph), that saw the 258km polished off in a scant 5hr 16min.

Pogačar also took a few KoMs to add to his extensive set, including the Beuvry-la-foret to Orchies sector – a crown he shares with Van Aert's team-mate Christophe Laporte, Stefan Bissegger (Decathlon CMA CGM) and yesterday's third place, Jasper Stuyven (Soudal Quick-Step).

Van Aert's ride has gained Strava kudos from 119,504 people, Pogačar's 75,041. However, neither man has furnished us with what would have been the icing on the Strava cake – their power figures. In a race like yesterday's when they were pushing so hard for so long, the wattages would no doubt have been double-take impressive.

Sadly for fans, such things are the stuff of trade secrets, although Pogačar has posted his on occasion, as well as telling an interviewer that his zone two rates at 320-340 watts.

For a day or three at least, neither rider is likely to be pushing too hard on the pedals as they recover, Pogačar in readiness for next Sunday's Liège-Bastogne-Liège and Van Aert for what's currently his next scheduled race, the newly named Tour Auvergne-Rhône Alpes (formerly Critérium du Dauphiné) in June.

Tadej Pogačar has been in this situation before. Sitting cross-armed in front of the media, his bottom lip is lined with dry mud, his eyebrows bushy with dust. The first question in the press conference comes, and the world champion replies with eight words: “I feel good. I was happy with today.” The reporter, stumped by the brevity, follows up with another. “Are you not tired?” he asks. This time, Pogačar just shrugs and smiles – his weary eyes give as clear an answer as any words could.

The prophecy told that Tadej Pogačar would win Paris-Roubaix. For months, he was touted as the chosen one: the boy from Klanec – a leafy Slovenian village with one restaurant and a population fewer than 350 – who was destined to become the first rider since Roger De Vlaeminck in 1977 to win all five Monuments. He might still, but for now at least, his shot at history has been deferred.

Just half a second separated Pogačar from Monument immortality inside the Roubaix velodrome on Sunday. There was a roar from the crowd when he led Visma-Lease a Bike’s Wout van Aert into the concrete bowl, and another, louder roar when Van Aert kicked away from him round the final bend, to win by the length of his shadow.

Humble in defeat, Pogačar is quick to praise the rider he spent the last 50km alongside. “He [Van Aert] deserves the victory,” Pogačar says, and his brief, downbeat figure gives way to thoughtful reflection. “Every time I tried [to get rid of him], my legs were not the greatest anymore. I always saw him really riding on my wheel. He was so strong that I could feel it was just not meant to be today to drop him.”

Pogačar’s race truly began with 120km remaining. Victim of a puncture before the Arenberg Forest, he scrambled onto a Shimano neutral service bike, lost almost a minute to his rivals, but chased back to the front, swapping for a spare bike he took from the roof of his team car.

“Today was a lot of flat tyres,” he says bluntly. “First I was riding with a front tyre half flat, and then I broke the wheel on the back and I couldn’t ride anymore. I got the Shimano bike and it was big gaps across the groups.”

By the time Pogačar reached the Arenberg, he was feeling, in his words, “a little bit bananas”. He passed through the race’s most daunting sector unscathed, but his misfortune didn’t end there; a second puncture, and a third bike change, came with 72km to go, and he found himself in a dash to hold off his Classics rival Mathieu van der Poel, who ultimately wouldn’t claw back his own flat-tyred woes.

The stress of the efforts, it’s clear, took it out of the world champion. “Always when you have problems you waste a little bit of energy and it’s like this,” he says. “I don’t regret anything. It’s how this race goes.”

Was there anything he feels could have done differently? “There’s always something that you could do differently. Right now, so close after the race, I think I did all my best, but maybe tomorrow, after the dust settles, we will maybe analyse and see what I could have done better. I think in such a chaotic race, I did pretty good. I gave my best. No regrets, for sure.”

An hour after his press conference, Pogačar reemerged under the sun in the Roubaix velodrome to a ripple of applause. His face was now clean, thanks to a visit to the famous showers, and his clothes fresh from the team bus. He then sat down on the grassy infield, laughing with his family and friends, as he waited for the podium ceremony to begin.

The bitter aftermath of the result had vanished. No, it wasn’t meant to be this time, but there will be another chance, and another, for as long as his will allows.

“I think I will be back, maybe not next year, but I still have a few years of my career I hope,” he reassured the press. “I will try to come back and give it a go again.”

Already a winner of Milan-San Remo, the Tour of Flanders, Liège-Bastogne-Liège and Il Lombardia, Pogačar's date with Roubaix destiny remains academic. His face may not appear on the Mount Rushmore of Monument winners just yet, but, after a second, closer runner-up place, there's a feeling his portrait in the granite is waiting.

"The cobbles, the stress on the body, it’s definitely one of the roughest, toughest, hardest races I’ve done. I think I gained some experience that maybe next time that I come here it will not be so extremely hard as it was today."

Almost 365 days ago, that was Tadej Pogačar's verdict after his debut Paris-Roubaix, where he finished second, looking as exhausted as I have ever seen him after a race. It wasn't the buoyant, jokey man we have all become used to, but someone who had been put through the wringer.

He finished second that day, behind Mathieu van der Poel, after a performance which belied any kind of conception of what we thought about the 'Hell of the North'. We might have expected the supreme race-craft, the positioning and the power, but this was a Tour de France winner, a climber, going toe-to-toe with Van der Poel, without any experience of the race. He did crash, possibly showing his naivety, but he still finished second, beating Classics specialists like Mads Pedersen and Wout van Aert.

Last year it felt like an adventure, almost a free hit – we didn't know what to expect, so second place was huge, a confirmation that yes, the Slovenian could do something not seen since 1981, and win both the Tour and Roubaix.

This year is different. There is pressure on the UAE Team Emirates-XRG rider, because we all know he could win. Forget question marks over his knowledge of the race, over whether he's heavy enough to perform on the pavé or whether a general classification rider could look at home in the biggest Classic of them all.

It is now a serious possibility, maybe even 50:50, that Pogačar will win Paris-Roubaix. He is no longer a wildcard, an outsider, and could become the first person since Roger De Vlaeminck in 1977 to win all five Monuments, and become the first person ever to be the champion of all five at the same time. Liège-Bastogne-Liège and Il Lombardia last year, Milan-San Remo and the Tour of Flanders in 2026. There is only one left. I will not be surprised if he wins. That would have once sounded ridiculous, but no more.

The 27-year-old goes into almost every race as the favourite, so this is nothing new for him, but it will change the perception of the race. His rivals can look to him and his team to pull, to chase every move, to be in charge of the race, essentially. A moment of inattention could result in an incident like last year's minor crash, or something altogether more serious. The stress will be real.

It is not a done deal, however, no fait accompli. This isn't Flanders, Strade Bianche, or Lombardia, races that suit Pogačar to an overwhelming extent. There is the chaos of the cobbles, and also the 170 riders in the race to contend with. Van der Poel of Alpecin-Premier Tech is top of the pile of these, with three wins in a row; he appears to be able to power through the race unlike anyone else, and has sprinter Jasper Philipsen as a teammate to muddy the waters in any chase. The Dutchman is chasing legendary status himself, with the opportunity to be the first person to win four in a row.

The race itself is incredibly flat, for a WorldTour event anyway. There isn't a clear route to victory for Pogačar, no Oude Kwaremont or Le Tolfe to climb away on.

"Maybe the best [thing] would be to attack with surprise, but I don’t think I can do that anymore. Everybody’s looking at me," Pogačar told Cycling Weekly earlier this year. "I’ll just go with the flow, see where the race takes me, and try to gamble for the final maybe, with a small group sprint. I know after such a tough race I can do, for me, a solid sprint. There’s always a chance."

Beyond Van der Poel and Philipsen, Lidl-Trek's Pedersen has finished on the podium of the last two editions, and is coming back into top form, while Van Aert of Visma-Lease a Bike is surely due another shot at victory at the race which probably suits him more than any other.

There's Ineos Grenadiers' Filippo Ganna, former world time trial champion, and winner of Dwars door Vlaanderen this year, and strong sprinters like Jordi Meeus (Red Bull-Bora-hansgrohe), Matthew Brennan (Visma-Lease a Bike), Arnaud De Lie (Lotto-Intermarché) and late addition Tim Merlier (Soudal Quick-Step). There is also a sense that the race is due a surprise winner, something not unusual at the mayhem in Northern France. It's 10 years since Mat Hayman won, after all.

However, there is something inevitable about Pogačar, something that just feels right. If he wins – if – it might not be a surprise, it would not scramble our brains, but perhaps it should. Riders in 2026 aren't supposed to be able to win it all, but somehow the Slovenian can and is. All we have to do now is sit back and watch history happen.

The news this week - beyond Tadej Pogačar and Demi Vollering's Tour of Flanders victories - has been dominated with small c crime. 54 riders are being investigated for crossing train tracks while a red light was showing during the Flemish race, and people have been stealing cobbles from the Paris-Roubaix course. Both offences could put riders in real, serious danger. Fortunately for those set to compete at Paris-Roubaix, Jonas Abrahamsen and his team Uno-X Mobility have been out on the cobbles with their magnifying glasses making sure everything is ship shape for Sunday.

The third Monument of the season is set to start at 9:30 UK time for the men's and 16:00 for the women's on Sunday 12th April. Could Tadej Pogačar equal Mathieu van der Poel's three-time title? Might Demi Vollering continue her Flanders form and bag another cobbled monument? Either way, the cobbles will be pristine - all thanks to a bunch of goats.

1. It’s news to me, but some of the core workmen gruelling over the Paris-Roubaix cobbles are actually goats. The herd - around 40 strong - take to the cobbles every year as a form of 'eco-grazing', removing the need for chemical weed killers.

2. Buona Pasqua! Cyclist and social media influencer Elisa Scarlatta took to the Italian streets to spread some Easter joy last weekend - featuring the cutest crochet (?) bike/egg bag.

3. Scarlatta wasn’t the only one delivering chocolate to her fellow cyclists this weekend. SD Worx-Protime’s limited edition easter bunny mascot was doing the rounds this year at the Tour of Flanders.

4. For what Zoe Bäckstedt lacks in general knowledge she makes up in race results: after the interview, she blasted into fifth place at the Tour of Flanders, just behind last year’s winner, Lotte Kopecky.

5. One of the most scandalous things to have happened at the Tour of Flanders this year was a surprisingly common cycling phenomenon: a jumped red light. The peloton was divided after a train passed over a level crossing, splitting Tadej Pogačar and 54 others from a pack that included Mathieu van der Poel and Wout van Aert. Now those 50-plus riders could face fines by the Belgian public prosecutor’s office for the traffic offence.

6. Featuring in both Omloop Het Nieuwsblad and the Ronde, the Muur van Geraardsbergen is not for the faint of heart: 910 metres of climbing at an average incline of 9%, maxing out at 20%. It’s even harder if you’ve got a dog strapped to your back.

7. Ahead of the last cobbled Classic of the season this weekend, here’s a reminder of what not to do from the side lines. (This is a wince-inducing watch.)

8. Jonas Abrahamsen and Uno-X Mobility are taking no risks this weekend as he prepares to race Paris-Roubaix on Sunday.

9. Mathew Hayman: everyone’s favourite Paris-Roubaix winner. In 2016, the Aussie took victory in France after breaking his arm just six weeks earlier.

10. A bonus pic for my fellow goat fans. Unfortunately, they won’t be featuring on race day.

Tadej Pogačar's dominance is so powerful and unswerving that it goes beyond demotivating – it takes away all hope – so says Belgian rouleur Oliver Naesen of Decathlon CMA CGM.

He was speaking on the HLN Wielerpodcast, alongside former Classics star-turned-gravel racer Greg Van Avermaet, following yet another emphatic solo victory from Pogačar at the Tour of Flanders.

"What Tadej does actually goes a step further than being demotivating," said Naesen, a former podium finisher at both Milan-San Remo and Gent-Wevelgem (now called In Flanders Fields).

"Demotivating would be a rider who is very good – you can’t drop him and he beats you in the sprint," he elaborated. But Pogačar's ability "takes away all hope; the difference is simply that big.”

The Slovenian UAE Team Emirates-XRG rider is so good, he said, that these days even the major Classics specialists like Mathieu van der Poel (Alpecin-Premier Tech) and Wout van Aert (Visma-Lease a Bike) were unable to hold a candle to him.

“We used to sometimes talk about a peloton at two speeds; now there are three," Naesen said, adding: “He is a 10-star rider whom even they [Van der Poel and Van Aert] can’t even dream of keeping up with if the course is a bit tougher.”

Former Paris-Roubaix champion Van Avermaet concurred.

“Where does he get his physiological advantage?" Van Avermaet said. "They really need to examine that boy thoroughly to see what makes him put together so well.”

Van Avermaet qualified his comments by pointing out that Pogačar looked drawn and very tired after his Flanders win, saying: “I could tell by his eyes, which were bright red during the flash interviews, that he had suffered quite a bit, which is not illogical.”

The Slovenian will be put to the test again this Sunday at Paris-Roubaix – one of the two Monuments that he has specifically targeted this season (the other one being Milan-San Remo, which he has already won).

As one of those on the start list, Naesen will have another chance to experience Pogačar's unique brand of demotivating skills; but Van der Poel and Van Aert, as well as Mads Pedersen (Lidl-Trek), will all be there, hoping to prove that Pogačar is, at least sometimes, beatable.

Just over 70 kilometres into Sunday’s Tour of Flanders, 54 riders jumped a red light at a railway crossing. Now the Belgian prosecutors office is investigating the incident, which violates one of the country's most severe traffic offences.

Amongst the riders involved were race-leaders Tadej Pogačar and Remco Evenepoel, who jumped the red light before the barriers came down. The peloton was divided on either side of the railway tracks, with Mathieu van der Poel and Wout van Aert among the group caught behind the barriers.

"It was not nice," Pogačar said in the post-race press conference. "We were riding, and suddenly three guys jumped into the middle of the road and started waving to stop. How can you stop in one second?"

Nevertheless, jumping a red light comes under the most serious of Belgian traffic offences, and those found in breach of the rule could be summoned to appear in front of a police court, and could face a fine and driving ban.

“The risks to both riders and third parties are significant," the prosecutor’s office stated. “Such violations will therefore be dealt with strictly. This is unacceptable, even in a sporting context.”

The move also violates UCI rules, which state that ‘it shall be strictly forbidden to cross level crossings when the barrier is down or closing, the warning signal ringing or flashing.’ Riders who break this rule could face sanctions, a suspension of up to one month and a fine of between CHF 200 to 5,000. However, the race organisers chose not to disqualify the riders who crossed, instead slowing the following four kilometres to allow the second group to catch up.

In an interview with Wielerflits, Soudal Quick-Step's sports director, Sep Vanmarcke, emphasised Pogačar's frustration, saying: “Riders approach those crossings at around 55 kilometres per hour in a peloton. The first riders may see what’s happening, but those behind are looking at the wheel in front of them. Not everyone realises immediately that the light has turned red.

“Everyone involved, from the organisers to the authorities, knows exactly when a train is coming," he continued. "You cannot expect riders to know that. There is a shared responsibility to intervene in time and ensure safety.”

While no fines have yet been issued by the prosecutor's office, both Pogačar and Evenepoel were forced to pay up 500 and 200 Swiss Francs respectively, for littering and a 'sticky bottle' incident.

An out of court settlement may also be possible for the riders, as they await confirmation of penalties.

Tadej Pogačar's announcement last year that he had his sights on winning Milan-San Remo and Paris-Roubaix this season was met with a certain amount of scepticism. 'Optimistic scepticism' even, in some quarters: not everybody was entirely enamoured with the two-wheeled Terminator bulldozing his way through 2026.

But here we are, four months into the season, and whether you're a fan of the Slovenian's dominance or not, dominant he is. There aren't many riders who, after just three race days in four months, could command the awe that Pogačar is doing right now. But the panache and the emphatic manner of the UAE Team Emirates-XRG rider's wins in what are arguably the three biggest races of the men's season so far leave room for nothing, and nobody, else.

So far, Pogačar has wrapped up Milan-San Remo, Strade Bianche and, just this weekend, the Tour of Flanders. His 17km solo escape saw him become the eighth rider to have won the race a record three times and, along with Milan-San Remo, tick off his second Monument win of the season.

As has already been pointed out, a Pogačar on this kind of form could well see him become the first rider in history to win all five Monuments in a single season. Paris-Roubaix, just days away, represents the obvious stumbling block: with no hills and riders at the mercy of a choice of slippery dust or slippery mud on the choppy pavé, Pogačar won't be in his most natural terroir and, like all the riders, will face a heightened risk of punctures and crashes. But if he does manage to cross the line first in the fabled Roubaix velodrome, only Liège-Bastogne-Liège and Il Lombardia remain – and, with the Slovenian having taken eight wins across the pair, they have Tadej Pogačar written all over them.

What, then, could stop Pogačar from making history by swiping the full set in one season. Well, there are a few things.

His rivals

Pogačar may be dominant, but he does get beaten, even on days when he really, really wants to win. It has happened at the Tour de France, and in Paris-Roubaix and the Tour of Flanders too. If the Slovenian finds himself on an off-day, or a little bit out of position, there are a number of rivals who could step in and take advantage.

Tom Pidcock (Pinarello-Q36.5 Pro Cycling) may be recovering from his fall into a ravine at the Volta a Catalunya, but he'll be back and he has a great record in hilly one-day races, having won Strade Bianche and Amstel Gold.

Remco Evenepoel (Red Bull-Bora-hansgrohe) can go one better – he has won Liège-Bastogne-Liège on two occasions and, as a card-carrying Belgian hero, is fully invested. He'll be there at Ardennes Week too, which is more than we can currently say with confidence about Pidcock.

Other riders who, on a good day, could be capable of besting Pogačar on a bad day in the hilly Classics include former LBL runner-up Giulio Ciccone (Lidl-Trek), Pogačar's own team-mate Isaac del Toro (fifth at Lombardia last year) and, possibly, Paul Seixas (Decathlon CMA CGM). The French rider still has much to prove but, at the rate he is progressing, could soon become Pogačar's nemesis.

Burnout

Towards the end of last year's Tour de France, an uncharacteristically gloomy Pogačar told the world that he was looking forward to the race being over. Although we now know he had a potentially race-ending knee injury, it was also revealed after the Tour that the Slovenian was mentally exhausted. His mother even talked about the vague possibility of him retiring early.

Some R&R post-Tour clearly did the trick, because he came back to win the Euros, the Worlds and Lombardia, but we had seen a vulnerable side to him that had not been on display before.

He is now experiencing the double-edged sword of success, honed to its finest edge: the more you win, the more pressure there is. So far this season he will have experienced more of that than ever before as his highly publicised desire to win Milan-San Remo and Paris-Roubaix are pored over. It's likely at this point that joy takes a back seat to relief each time he wins a major race. Can he keep that up all season long?

'Acts of God'

Otherwise known as crashes, illness, mechanicals and punctures. It sometimes appears that the most successful riders have better luck than their rivals. But they are, of course, subject to the same rules of the universe as the rest – with a few caveats. They might be slightly less likely to crash because more and more meticulous planning has gone into ensuring that doesn't happen. Riders around them might take a little more care too – after all, who wants to be responsible for bringing Tadej Pogačar down in a season-ending crash.

But the top riders often end up racing harder, and as the likes of Jonas Vingegaard (Itzulia Basque Country 2024), Wout van Aert (Dwars door Vlaanderen 2024) and Remco Evenepoel (training crash, Dec 2024) have all demonstrated, bad luck happens to the best riders. Even Pogačar has had his fair share of crashes, including a wrist fracture in Liège-Bastogne-Liège 2023 and an unpleasant fall in the recent Milan-San Remo that left him bruised and his bike damaged.

The playing field is level too when it comes to punctures and mechnicals. Pogi's bike might get an extra look over before a big day, but then so will those of his big rivals. It's the same for illness, although given how many hands the Slovenian is forced to shake on account of his fame he might experience more viral exposure than most.

And so it's far from impossible that Pogačar's assault on the big five one-day races could be ended by a boring, run-of-the-mill piece of a bad luck. A random touch of wheels or an unfortunately placed flint. But let's hope not – not even his biggest rivals would want that.

There are probably a hundred other random occurrences that might mean Pogačar cannot win or even start one of the remaining Monuments. But those above are the corner marked 'most likely'. On the other side of the ring, in the white, blue and red corner stands Tadej Pogačar, with his immense wattages, on-bike technical ability and drive to succeed. It's going to be – literally – a Monumental battle. So far the Slovenian has given no indication that he might lose.

Often described as Merckxian in his achievements and the way he races, Tadej Pogačar made yet another bit of history on Sunday as he won the Tour of Flanders for a third time. It marked the twelfth Monument victory of his career and moved him ahead of Roger De Vlaeminck in the all-time list, meaning that he is now second only to Merckx himself.

The World Champion has been unstoppable so far this season, winning all three races that he has ridden, with victories at Strade Bianche and Milan-San Remo preceding his Flandrian triumph. He has now won four consecutive Monuments and is one win away from completing the full set.

With multiple victories at Liège-Bastogne-Liège and Il Lombardia to his name, a Paris-Roubaix cobble is the only omission from Pogačar’s Monument trophy cabinet. Having impressed on debut at last year’s race, he is set to return to the Hell of the North this weekend in the hopes of becoming only the fourth rider in history to win all of the Monuments.

If he were to win Roubaix, then he would be the only rider to ever hold all five race wins at the same time, and given his incredible record at Liège and Lombardia over the last few years, he could go on to become the first rider to win all five Monuments in a single season.

Speaking to Eurosport after his victory at Flanders, Pogačar was asked if he thought such a feat was possible, to which he replied, “In one year, I don’t know. Next week is the really tough one. I will give it a go, but it’s going to be difficult. I don’t want to think about it, but I’ll just go from race to race and enjoy Roubaix next.”

“Just to win one race, not even a Monument, is hard in cycling,” he continued. “Even if you have the best legs, everything needs to click together. Even after San Remo or today, I’m not thinking that I can win all five this year.”

Perhaps afraid of his words coming back to haunt him, or simply of jinxing it, the Slovenian rider’s objectives for the season are evident from his schedule alone, as he looks to win wherever he races.

Whatever happens, one thing seems certain: Tadej Pogačar will create yet more cycling history this season.

Everything hinges on Paris-Roubaix

If Tadej Pogačar is to win all five Monuments this season, then Paris-Roubaix will be his toughest challenge, as he has effectively shown that he can win Liège and Lombardia with his eyes closed at this point.

Of the five major one-day races, Pogačar’s characteristics are probably least suited to the Hell of the North, with his weight and size counting against him, as he is more susceptible to bouncing over the uneven cobbled roads.

The rigorous terrain did not seem to phase him too much on debut at last year’s race though, with only Mathieu van der Poel able to follow him over the pavé. It was ultimately a crash on a cobbled sector and a poorly timed puncture that put him out of contention, as he was forced to settle for second place whilst his Dutch rival soloed to victory.

Van der Poel will be his main adversary once again at this year’s race, with the likes of Mads Pedersen, Wout van Aert and Filippo Ganna also among the contenders. He will certainly have the power to match them over the cobbles, but the issue will be dropping them from his wheel if he hopes to avoid the uncertainty of a sprint in the Roubaix velodrome.

If Pogačar is able to get a gap, then it will be difficult to bring him back, as even Van der Poel struggled to make any inroads into his advantage once he went clear at the Tour of Flanders.

However, Roubaix is a different race and not always won by the strongest rider, as punctures and mechanicals are a constant. Luck will therefore be a major factor once again during this year’s race, and the Slovenian rider will need some on his side if he is to win.

One aspect that will play in Pogačar’s favour will be his team support, as UAE Team Emirates-XRG will bring a strong lineup to support the World Champion. Among their number will be former Paris-Roubaix runner-up Florian Vermeersch, who finished fifth at last year’s race and has been in tremendous form throughout the Spring Classics so far this season.

The Belgian rider will hope to be towards the front to support his leader as late into the race as possible, but it will ultimately be Pogačar’s own legs that decide the outcome of the race and whether or not history is made.

A decisive move on the final ascent of the Oude Kwaremont saw Tadej Pogačar triumph once again at the Tour of Flanders, as he claimed a record-equalling third victory at the race and the twelfth Monument win of his career.

The World Champion managed to drop Mathieu van der Poel on the penultimate climb of the race, before going solo to the finish in Oudenaarde, with the Dutchman forced to settle for second place, as he continued his impressive run of seven-consecutive podium finishes at this race.

“It was a really crazy race today,” said Pogačar in his post-race interview. “It was super hard and then it was a little bit of a waiting game. Still, it was an effort, pulling on the pedals all the time. When the group formed, I was happy that we kind of cooperated a bit and it was in good favour for me.”

It was an impressive Tour of Flanders debut for Remco Evenepoel, as the Olympic Champion managed to hang on for third place after being dropped by Pogačar on the Paterberg. Wout van Aert also continued his return to the top in the Classics with another fourth place finish for the third-consecutive year.

“For sure I didn’t want Remco back into the group,” Pogačar stated. “I know how much endurance he has as a rider. He can always overcome in the end and beat you, so I really tried to make a gap and it was good.”

Pogačar has taken the victory in all three races that he has so far ridden this season, two of which have been Monuments. He has also now won four-consecutive Monuments, with Paris-Roubaix being the only one that he is yet to win.

“I don’t race too much, so when I race there is pressure to win. So far everything has gone perfectly for me, so I can be more than happy. Coming next week to Roubaix, I can be motivated and try to enjoy the cobbles,” Pogačar concluded.

How It Happened

A thirteen-rider breakaway went up the road at the beginning of the day, with Connor Swift (Ineos Grenadiers) and Silvan Dillier (Alpecin-Premier Tech) among those at the head of the race.

Their gap was kept at around three minutes by the peloton, until a level crossing came down with 213km to go and effectively split the bunch in half. The commissaires then neutralised the main group, forcing the riders in the front half of the split to wait for those behind, which allowed the gap to the breakaway to expand to over five minutes.

With Dillier up the road, Alpecin-Premier Tech left the other teams to do the vast majority of the work in the peloton during the early part of the race. The fight for position then began as they approached the first cobbled sectors, which saw the gap to the breakaway come down rapidly.

After the first ascent of the Oude Kwaremont, the favourites’ teams all came to the fore once again in the run-in to the Molenberg, with Florian Vermeersch (UAE Team Emirates-XRG) leading the group as they made the left turn onto the climb with 103km to go. The Belgian rider then made a massive effort to split the race, as he drew a group of sixteen riders clear as they went over the top of the climb.

All of the main pre-race favourites had made the split, with Tadej Pogačar (UAE Team Emirates-XRG), Mathieu van der Poel (Alpecin-Premier Tech), Wout van Aert (Visma-Lease a Bike), Mads Pedersen (Lidl-Trek) and Remco Evenepoel (Red Bull-Bora Hansgrohe) all in attendance, and they quickly built advantage, as those behind struggled to organise a chase.

The group of favourites then caught the early breakaway with 78km to go, with some of the riders able to offer up support to their teammates who had joined them at the head of the race, before Pogačar and Evenepoel began to press on again on the Berg Ten Houte. Both riders keen to drop any dead weight from the newly enlarged group, but it was far from enough to unsettle any of the other contenders.

Pogačar then made his first major attack on the second ascent of the Oude Kwaremont with 57km to go, with Van Aert, Pedersen and Evenepoel immediately in the wheel, whilst Van der Poel was caught slightly out of position as they began the climb and had to force his way through to the front of the group.

Approaching the top of the climb, Pedersen began to lose contact as Pogačar continued to push on, with Van Aert also then buckling under the pressure being applied by the World Champion, as he was distanced as they turned off the cobbled sector.

The leading trio were then quickly onto the Paterberg, with Evenepoel going to the front as they hit the bottom of the climb in an attempt to press on. However, that effort would ultimately be his undoing, as Pogačar and Van der Poel gradually came around him and began to open up a gap to the Olympic champion.

He was still within sight of the two at the front over the top of the climb, but every time it looked as though he would catch back on, the Pogačar stamped on the pedals once more and put a bit more distance into the gap, as the World Champion was clearly keen to keep his Belgian rival behind.

Van der Poel made a half-hearted attempt to put Pogačar under pressure on the Taaienberg with 38km to go, before the Slovenian rider then returned the favour on the Oude Kruisberg. However, both riders knew that the race would ultimately be decided on the final ascent of the Oude Kwaremont.

Onto the penultimate climb of the race, Pogačar wasted no time in going to the front, as he made one of his typical seated accelerations and instantly began to distance Van der Poel. The Dutchman managed to keep the gap in check at first, but then gradually began to slip backwards as they neared the top of the climb.

As they turned off the cobbles, Pogačar had a six-second gap to Van der Poel, which had only grown as they hit the Paterberg, where the sole leader then pressed on once again to further extend his advantage.

Over the top of the final climb with 13km to go, Pogačar began time trialling his way to the finish, with Van der Poel unable to reduce his deficit, which only continued to grow as they approached Oudenaarde.

The long straight road to the finish gave Pogačar plenty of time to sit up and celebrate his third victory at the Tour of Flanders, punching the air in celebration as he crossed the line, whilst Van der Poel and Evenepoel rolled in to complete the podium. Behind them, Van Aert had dropped Pedersen on the final ascent of the Oude Kwaremont and ultimately finished more than forty seconds ahead of him to take fourth place, whilst the Dane settled for fifth.

Results

Tour of Flanders Men 2026: Antwerp > Oudenaarde (278km)

1. Tadej Pogačar (Slo) UAE Team Emirates-XRG, in 6:20:07
2. Mathieu van der Poel (Ned) Alpecin-Premier Tech, +34s
3. Remco Evenepoel (Bel) Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe, +1:11
4. Wout van Aert (Bel) Visma-Lease a Bike, +2:04
5. Mads Pedersen (Den) Lidl-Trek, +2:48
6. Jasper Stuyven (Bel) Soudal Quick-Step, +4:28
7. Florian Vermeersch (Bel) UAE Team Emirates-XRG, at same time
8. Matej Mohorič (Slo) Bahrain Victorious, +4:30
9. Christophe Laporte (Fra) Visma-Lease a Bike, +5:22
10. Gianni Vermeersch (Bel) Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe, at same time

The jersey that Tadej Pogačar wore to win Milan-San Remo last month has fetched a huge €95,100 at auction. The UAE Team Emirates-XRG top features Pogačar's world champion's rainbow bands, as well as the signatures of the Slovenian and his team-mates.

Pogačar won the race in a photo finish sprint with Tom Pidcock (Pinarello-Q36.5 Pro Cycling), but not before he had crashed on the run-in to the climb of the Cipressa. He was able to make his way back through the bunch and make the winning move on the climb, but the jersey bears the marks of that fall, adding to its story as a piece of cycling history.

The auction, which ran on the Galabid site, featured a starting bid of €1,000 and finished at the beginning of Paris-Roubaix on Sunday, with the winning bid coming from an anonymous bidder. That bid will now be doubled by Pogačar himself, and the proceeds will go to the Tadej Pogačar Foundation, which has a wide overall remit but in this case will use the money to help children and young people in need, according to the auction write-up.

It said: "At Milano–Sanremo 2026, Tadej Pogačar crashed 32 km before the finish, continued with a damaged bike and a torn jersey, and still won.

"This is that jersey. It's signed by Tadej and his teammates.

"We are auctioning the original race-worn piece, exactly as it was that day. The winning amount will be doubled by Tadej and donated to his Foundation, supporting children and young people in need."

This is not the first time that collectors have been able to bid on a piece of Pogačar's career history. Only last December his Colnago Y1Rs went on auction at Sothebys and succeeded in fetching a mammoth $190,500 (£142,713). Pogačar had ridden to the 'Stripped Black' raw carbon bike, which featured rainbow accents, from the Mont Ventoux stage of the Tour de France onwards, and throughout the latter part of the season. They were some of the most successful months of his career, with victories in the Kigali World Championships, the European Championships and Il Lombardia adding to his fourth Tour de France victory.

There are days until the 2026 Tour de France, with teams setting off down the start ramp of the team time trial in Barcelona on stage one on the afternoon of Saturday 4 July.

It is just hours until we will be tracking the world's best cyclists around l'Hexagone. You can read the full start list here, and check out the route guide while you're at it.

Therefore, we thought this would be the perfect time to assess the runners and riders that will likely take to the start line of the 113th edition of the race, all of whom will harbour some hope of pulling on the yellow jersey 23 days later in Paris. This is the Cycling Weekly power list.

There are two former winners on this list, and two Tour de France debutants, one of whom is also the next great hope of French cycling.

Of course, what no one can ignore is the fact Tadej Pogačar appears to be unbeatable. He won the last two Tours in such dominant fashion most people probably assume he's nailed on to win. But he isn't. A loss of form, injury or tactical miscalculation are never more than one bad day away.

1. Tadej Pogačar (UAE Team Emirates-XRG)

Age: 27
Nationality: Slovenian
Tour de France appearances: 6
Tour de France overall wins: 4
Tour de France stage wins: 21
Best GC position: 1st

Indisputably the best male bike rider in the world, Tadej Pogačar has dominated the last two Tours de France, and there is little evidence that this is going to end soon. Last year he only won four stages on his way to overall victory by four minutes, despite suffering from a knee injury during the races latter stages.

This season, it has gone pretty well so far: 16 race days, 13 victories. An expected masterclass at Strade Bianche was followed by an epic sprint win at Milan-San Remo, edging the Slovenian closer to completing the set of Monuments.

He went on to win the Tour of Flanders, and finish second at Paris-Roubaix, before winning Liège-Bastogne-Liège again. The Slovenian won four stages and the overall at the Tour de Romandie, and then three stages and the overall at the Tour de Suisse.

It's hard to see where the cracks in Pogačar's armour are, although the route this year does not necessarily allow for him to crush all in his customary manner, although I'm sure he will try.

It's hard to bet against him.

2. Jonas Vingegaard (Visma-Lease a Bike)

Age: 29
Nationality: Danish
Tour de France appearances: 5
Tour de France overall wins: 2
Tour de France stage wins: 4
Best GC position: 1st

Jonas Vingegaard's season couldn't have been more different to Tadej Pogačar's. There was no one-day racing, instead a total focus on stage races, and the Giro d'Italia was the priority before even beginning to think about the Tour.

The Dane, the reigning Vuelta a España champion, completed the set of Grand Tours with a Giro title in May, and hopes to then carry that form into the Tour in July. Pogačar completed the Giro-Tour double in 2024, so could Vingegaard do the same? It will be tricky, although he won the second Grand Tour he took part in last year.

Vingegaard did not race before Paris-Nice this year, due to illness, but his performance there certainly would have made many take notice.

He went on to win at the Volta a Catalunya, with two stage wins, before winning four stages en route to victory at the Giro by five minutes, another Pogačar-like ride.

3. Isaac del Toro (UAE Team Emirates-XRG)

Age: 22
Nationality: Mexican
Tour de France appearances: 0
Tour de France overall wins: 0
Tour de France stage wins: 0
Best GC position: n/a

As Pogačar's teammate, Isaac del Toro not Plan A for UAE. If anything happens to the Slovenian, though, he would be thought of as a contender alongside Vingegaard.

Denied a maiden Grand Tour victory at the Giro d'Italia last year due to Simon Yates and Visma-Lease a Bike brilliance, and some odd tactics, the 22-year-old is clearly a rider who could win a Grand Tour, the question is just when.

In 2026, Del Toro has won the UAE Tour, Tirreno-Adriatico, and the Tour Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes, to boot. He seems to be able to do it all, like his starrier teammate, it just remains to be seen whether he will be allowed to ride his own race or work fully in support of Pogačar. There could easily be a UAE one-two in Paris at the end of July.

4. Paul Seixas (Decathlon CMA CGM)

Age: 19
Nationality: French
Tour de France appearances: 0
Tour de France overall wins: 0
Tour de France stage wins: 0
Best GC position: n/a

The breakout rider of 2026 is Paul Seixas, the 19-year-old French star. There's a lot of pressure from France on the teenager's shoulders, but it doesn't appear to have affected him too much yet, with impressive performances at Algarve, the Faun-Ardèche Classic and Strade Bianche starting his season.

He went on to win Itzulia Basque Country and La Flèche Wallonne to send the hype machine into overdrive, before second-place at Liège-Bastogne-Liège. However, he was forced to quit the Tour Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes after crashing, which tampered expectations a bit.

We don't know how he will fare in a Grand Tour, considering he's never raced one before, let alone the behemoth which is the Tour. However, Decathlon definitely have a star on their hands.

5. Remco Evenepoel (Red Bull-Bora-hansgrohe)

Age: 26
Nationality: Belgian
Tour de France appearances: 2
Tour de France overall wins: 0
Tour de France stage wins: 2
Best GC position: 3rd

After the first few races of 2026, there was a lot of talk around Remco Evenepoel, including from myself. The Belgian won seven of his first 11 races this season, including Valenciana overall, and looked to have truly hit the ground running at his new team.

However, a disappointing end to the UAE Tour saw those expectations cooled, and there remains a bit of mystery around Evenepoel ahead of the Tour. He hasn't raced since Liège-Bastogne-Liége, and his last stage race was the Volta a Catalunya in March, where he finished third.

He still managed to finish third at the Tour of Flanders and Liège, winning the Amstel Gold Race in between, so all is not lost, but his form is unknown.

He will have a solid team, including last year's third-place, Florian Lipowitz, so will have more backing than he ever did at Soudal Quick-Step. That said, though, it is still a bit up-in-the-air if he can deliver on the same level as Vingegaard over three weeks and over the high mountains, let alone Pogačar.

6. Juan Ayuso (Lidl-Trek)

Age: 23
Nationality: Spanish
Tour de France appearances: 1
Tour de France overall wins: 0
Tour de France stage wins: 0
Best GC position: n/a

Juan Ayuso hit the ground running at Lidl-Trek, winning the Volta ao Algarve in his first race at his new team, before an untimely crash took him out of Paris-Nice while he was in the race lead.

He failed to finish Itzulia Basque Country, too, but returned to form at the Tour Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes, where he finished third behind his former teammate Isaac del Toro.

The Spaniard, free of super-domestique duties at UAE Team Emirates, can now show his old team what they're missing, although he is yet to thread together a complete performance at a Grand Tour. That said, he has finished third and fourth overall at the Vuelta.

Lidl have been building a solid GC team, and with Ayuso at the point of the spear, are serious contenders.

7. Tom Pidcock (Pinarello Q36.5)

Age: 26
Nationality: British
Tour de France appearances: 3
Tour de France overall wins: 0
Tour de France stage wins: 1
Best GC position: 13th

Third at the Vuelta a España last year, second at Milan-San Remo, a winner four times this year, Tom Pidcock is clearly a star of the peloton. However, he's on the record as not going for GC at the Tour, instead aiming for a stage win.

This will be Pinarello Q36.5's aim at their debut at the biggest race of them all, but there's also no reason why Pidcock couldn't aim at the top 10, if not higher, at the Tour. He proved last summer that he can ride Grand Tours, after years of promise, and this Tour could suit him.

Best of the rest

Tobias Halland Johannessen (Uno-X Mobility) was sixth at the Tour last year, and could easily repeat that again in July. He was fifth at the recent Tour Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes. Fellow top-10 finisher Ben Healy (EF Education-EasyPost) will surely be aiming for stage wins over GC, but he could defy expectations again.

Florian Lipowitz (Red Bull-Bora-hansgrohe) was third last year, but has moved out of the limelight with the arrival of Evenepoel to his team, but is a fantastic option for his squad, and it would not be a surprise were he to shine brighter than his starrier teammate. Other teammates of riders of the list to watch out for include Matteo Jorgenson (Visma-Lease a Bike), Brandon McNulty (UAE Team Emirates-XRG) Jai Hindley (Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe) and Mattias Skjelmose (Lidl-Trek), although one would think these are secondary or tertiary choices for the overall.

Netcompany-Ineos' Kévin Vaquelin finished in the top 10 last season, but for different teams. He finished in the top 10 of the Volta ao Algarve, Paris-Nice and Itzulia Basque Country this year. Alongside double-stage winner from last year Thymen Arensman, they are the British team's best hopes for the top 10.

Also with the chance of finishing high are Antonio Tiberi and Lenny Martinez (Bahrain-Victorious), Richard Carapaz (EF Education-EasyPost) and Ben O'Connor (Jayco AlUla).

Having crashed on the run-in to the Cipressa in the weekend's Milan-San Remo, Tadej Pogačar, admitted he thought his race was over. As we all know now, he made a typically stunning comeback to take his first win in the race on the Via Roma, but had he known the full story, he may well not have even bothered.

It turns out that the Slovenian's victorious ride, which saw him outsprint Tom Pidcock (Pinarello-Q36.5) on the line in San Remo, was done on a cracked frame with, incredibly, a rubbing rear brake, the damage incurred in the earlier crash. All this only transpired after the race, upon inspection of the UAE Team Emirates-XRG rider's Colnago V5Rs.

Pogačar's mechanic, Boštjan Kavčnik, explained: “Only after the finish did we realise Tadej had ridden the finale on a cracked frame,” he told Slovenian outlet Delo.si. “The rear triangle was damaged, but fortunately it held together. The disc was also rubbing against the braking surface.”

The four-time Tour de France winner had crashed on his left-hand side at the front of the peloton as they raced towards the foot of the Cipressa climb – one of two key ascents in the finale, along with the Poggio that follows. He was using a single ring set-up for light weight and aerodynamics, explained Kavčnik, so there was no left-hand shifter but, all the same, his Shimano Dura-Ace Di2 gears went into crash mode.

“He reset it himself and didn’t notice anything else wrong, so we didn’t change the bike,” the mechanic said.

Despite the crash, and the damage, Pogačar was quickly up and was able to forge a gap with Pidcock and Mathieu van der Poel (Alpecin-Premier Tech) on the Cipressa. They took that advantage to the Poggio where Pogačar attacked again, dropping Van der Poel but taking Pidcock with him. A daredevil run off the hill followed as two of the world's best descenders attempted to draw out an advantage, but, said Kavčnik, “If he had known the true condition, he would never have descended so aggressively."

Having been used to best Pidcock by half a wheel, Pogačar's Colnago has become a luxurious and storied museum piece. No longer useable, "it will go into his special collection," Kavčnik said.

Tadej Pogačar once again showed the true champion that he is, as he won Milan-San Remo ahead of Tom Pidcock in a two-up sprint on the Via Roma. The pair had managed to drop last year’s winner Mathieu van der Poel on the Poggio and came into the final sprint together, but it was the World Champion who emerged victorious, as he claimed one of the few major races to have eluded him thus far in his career.

Though many would have expected Pogačar to win La Classicissima at some point or another, few would have predicted the manner in which he would end up doing so, as the Slovenian rider suffered a crash shortly before the start of the Cipressa, leaving him with road rash, shredded kit and a massive battle to get back to the head of the race with 33km to go.

The crash had clearly had an effect on him, but the short time that it took him to return to the front of the peloton was nothing short of spectacular and a credit to his UAE Team Emirates-XRG teammates, who then launched him onto the attack with 24km to go, with only Pidcock and Van der Poel able to go with him.

“When I crashed, I thought it was all over,” said Pogačar in his post-race interview. “To crash in Imperia just before the most important part of the race is not ideal, but luckily I was quickly back on the bike and there was not too much damage to me or the bike.

“Then I saw my team, Florian [Vermeersch] and Felix [Großschartner], they left out everything to come back to the front. They gave me back hope and the legs were still okay, Brandon [McNulty] and Isaac [del Toro] did the rest on the Cipressa. Today if there’s no team, then I would not go right onto the Cipressa, but I would have gone straight through to the finish line.”

After the trio worked together in the few kilometres between the Cipressa and the Poggio, Pogačar then managed a feat that he has attempted unsuccessfully in each of the previous three editions, as he dropped Van der Poel with an attack on the lower slopes of the Poggio, with the Dutchman unable to hold the wheel on the rapid ascent.

“When we were pulling turns, I was really happy that everybody worked,” Pogačar continued. “It was a bit of a headwind, so not ideal like last year and it was a bit harder in the middle part. When we hit the Poggio, it was a better wind this year, so I tried to go all out there. The ideal would be to go alone, but Tom Pidcock was really strong. Chapeau to Mathieu, he did an amazing race also, but in the end me and Tom came together and I was lucky in the sprint.”

Pidcock was able to stay in contact over the top of the climb and on the descent, despite Pogačar putting pressure on the British rider with multiple accelerations. As they came off the downhill and into San Remo, it was clear that they would have to work together to maintain their narrow advantage over the peloton behind, but once they reached the Via Roma, both riders’ focus quickly turned to the sprint.

Pidcock forced Pogačar to the front in the final few hundred metres, but then slightly boxed himself in against the barriers when the sprint was launched. The Q36.5 Pro Cycling rider then attempted to burst out of the slipstream, but did not have enough to come around his rival, with Pogačar winning by half a wheel on the line.

“Tom is a really fast guy, we all know this. He’s punchy, he’s fast and he looks in really good shape, so I was a bit afraid when he let me go first and I was waiting for as long as possible, but I also know I cannot wait too long, because he has a better kick than me probably. In the end, I was surprised. It was really close and chapeau to him,” the World Champion concluded.

How It Happened

At 298km in length, the men’s edition of Milan-San Remo is the longest race on the WorldTour calendar, known for its long drawn-out prelude before a frantic finale along the coast, with the short punchy climbs of the Cipressa and Poggio in the closing kilometres before the descent into San Remo and the finish on the Via Roma.

The day began with an embarrassing incident for race organisers RCS Sport, as shortly after flag drop, the lead motorcycles and commissaires’ cars took the wrong exit of a roundabout, leading around a dozen riders from the freshly formed breakaway off course and leaving them to chase back on to the peloton.

This is the second mishap in as many weeks for the Italian organisation, as a similar incident occurred at Strade Bianche Donne, where the favourites’ group was led off course by a lead motorcycle.

An early breakaway did eventually form a few kilometres later, with Martin Marcellusi (Bardiani CSF 7 Saber), Manuele Tarozzi (Bardiani CSF 7 Saber), Lorenzo Milesi (Movistar), Manlio Moro (Movistar), Andrea Peron (Novo Nordisk), David Lozano (Novo Nordisk), Alexy Faure Prost (Picnic PostNL), Dario Igor Belletta (Polti VisitMalta) and Mirco Maestri (Polti VisitMalta) forming a nine-rider group at the head of the race.

Their gap was kept in check by the peloton in the early part of the race, with Silvan Dillier (Alpecin-Premier Tech) playing a key role in pacing at the front of the bunch, as he rode with little to no assistance for kilometre after kilometre, just as he did twelve months ago.

Teams did begin to come to the front of the peloton for the Passo del Turchino, as they looked to keep their leaders in good position for the climb and the subsequent descent, and despite pre-race rumours that UAE Team Emirates-XRG would look to make the race hard on the climb, it all remained relatively calm as teams looked to conserve energy for the latter part of the race.

The descent that followed then brought the riders onto the coast, with the pace going completely out of the peloton, as the gap to the breakaway swelled to nearly seven minutes with around 80km to go. This forced Domen Novak (UAE Team Emirates-XRG) to take over from the tiring Dillier, who had been riding almost non-stop on the front for about two-hundred kilometres.

Novak’s efforts did see the gap begin to come down, as teams also began to get organised behind him. The reason for which became apparent with 65km to go, as a tangle between two riders from Ineos Grenadiers and Q36.5 Pro Cycling caused several riders to crash, whilst others were also held up behind. Fortunately for both teams, Filippo Ganna and Tom Pidcock both managed to narrowly avoid the crash and maintain their position at the front of the peloton.

Tension in the bunch then grew further as the race began the approach towards the Tre Capi, with more and more teams trying to come to the fore to position themselves. It was also in the run-in to the Capo Mele that the Novo Nordisk pair of Lozano and Peron were both dropped from the breakaway, leaving seven riders at the head of the race.

As they came onto the Capo Mele, their advantage over the peloton stood at four minutes, but that was reduced by thirty seconds as the peloton came over the top of the climb and continued to tumble as UAE Team Emirates-XRG set the pace on the front of the main group.

Over the Capo Cervo and the Capo Berta, Alpecin-Premier Tech, Ineos Grenadiers and Q36.5 Pro Cycling all began to jostle for position and control. Meanwhile, the breakaway began to splinter at the head of the race, with Faure Prost, Moro, Tarozzi and Marcellusi all dropped from the lead group and their advantage coming down to just over a minute.

Coming off the Capo Berta and into Imperia, one of the biggest moments in the race occurred as Tadej Pogačar (UAE Team Emirates-XRG) slid out through a left-hand bend, causing several riders to crash behind him, including Wout van Aert (Visma-Lease a Bike) and Mathieu van der Poel (Alpecin-Premier Tech).

This left the World Champion battered, bruised and forced to chase back on, whilst Van Aert suffered a mechanical in the crash and had to wait for a bike change. Van der Poel was the least affected of the three and was able to remount his bike almost instantly, despite suffering some abrasions to his left hand and arm.

There was no thought of waiting for them though, with the race was full on in the peloton as they approached the Cipressa, as the unaffected teams continued to drive the pace. Van der Poel was the first to return, as Jasper Philipsen (Alpecin-Premier Tech) helped to bring him back to the bunch around a kilometre before the start of the penultimate climb.

The final three riders from the breakaway were then caught as the peloton went onto the Cipressa, with Josh Tarling (Ineos Grenadiers) leading onto the climb with Filippo Ganna in his wheel. Meanwhile, Pogačar had made his way onto the back of the peloton as they began the climb, with Brandon McNulty (UAE Team Emirates-XRG) dropping back to help navigate him through the bunch and bring him back into contention.

It was not long until the now slightly tattered rainbow bands were visible at the front of the peloton once again and despite the injuries to their leader, UAE Team Emirates-XRG wasted no time in setting up the inevitable attack, as McNulty emptied the tank before Isaac del Toro made an acceleration to launch Pogačar with 24km to go.

Pidcock had anticipated the Slovenian’s move and was equal to it when it finally came, staying glued to the wheel with Van der Poel just behind him. However, unlike last year, Filippo Ganna was unable to follow the move, as he lost the wheel and the three riders began to gain separation.

There were still 2.5km to the top of the climb, but it was clear that this would be the decisive move as the gap continued to grow over the group behind, with Lidl-Trek attempting to organise a chase from the riders they had left.

Over the top of the climb, the leading trio had a gap of twenty-five seconds as they went onto the descent of the Cipressa, with Pogačar continuing to press on. They then rejoined the coastal road and began the run towards the Poggio, working together to maintain their advantage over the chasing group, which had swelled in numbers as riders had made their way back on the descent.

Those extra numbers did help the chase behind, as the leaders’ advantage had come down to under ten seconds as they turned onto the Poggio with 9km to go. It was at this point that Pogačar launched another acceleration, which dispatched Van der Poel, with the Dutchman unable to handle the pressure being applied by the World Champion.

As the defending champion began to drift backwards, Pidcock was forced to jump across to Pogačar’s wheel, as he was the only one able to follow the infernal pace being set at the head of the race. The British rider would then be hit with another acceleration towards the top of the climb, but was once again equal to it and still looked relatively comfortable following the wheel.

Going onto the descent, Pidcock came to the front in an attempt to put Pogačar under pressure, but it was not long until the Slovenian rider was ahead once again and accelerating out of the corners. It was not by no means enough to distance his breakaway companion, but he was certainly not making life easy for him either.

With just over two kilometres to go they came off the descent and entered into San Remo, beginning the final stretch before the finish on the Via Roma. The leading pair continued to work together, as they still only had a slender advantage over the group behind, who had caught Van der Poel on the descent.

A miraculous comeback from Wout van Aert then saw him attack from the group behind, with nobody able to follow the Belgian rider, who was trying to solo across the gap to the leaders.

Under the red kite and into the final kilometre, Pidcock adjusted his race suit as they swung onto the Via Roma. He had forced Pogačar to the front and the cooperation that he had shown in the previous kilometre suddenly disappeared. The World Champion began to freewheel and look behind, wary of his competitor’s punchy acceleration and a charging Van Aert, who was in sight of the two leaders.

Pidcock then attempted to surprise Pogačar by launching his sprint on the barrier side with two hundred metres to go, but got slightly boxed in and had to readjust before going again. However, this had also triggered Pogačar to launch his sprint, leaving the British rider with an almighty task to come around and pass his rival.

As he emerged from the slipstream, Pidcock began to get on terms and looked as though he could snatch the victory in the final metres, but the finish came just that bit too early and despite his efforts to throw his bike at the line, it was Pogačar that won the race by a matter of centimetres.

Behind them, a tiring Wout van Aert just managed to hold off the sprinters from the chasing group to finish in third place and take his first Monument podium since Paris-Roubaix in 2023. He finished ahead of Mads Pedersen (Lidl-Trek), who produced an impressive ride to take fourth place, as his start to the season had been completely derailed by injury after a crash in his first race at the Volta a la Comunitat Valenciana.

In the end, Van der Poel had to settle for a disappointing eighth place on the day, as he finished in the chasing group with thirty-five other riders, including other former winners Matej Mohorič (Bahrain Victorious) and Jasper Stuyven (Soudal Quick-Step).

Results

Milan-San Remo 2026: Pavia > San Remo (298km)

1. Tadej Pogačar (Slo) UAE Team Emirates-XRG, in 3:47:17
2. Tom Pidcock (GBr) Pinarello-Q36.5 Pro Cycling, at same time
3. Wout van Aert (Bel) Visma-Lease a Bike, +4s
4. Mads Pedersen (Den) Lidl-Trek
5. Corbin Strong (NZl) NSN Cycling
6. Andrea Vendrame (Ita) Jayco AlUla
7. Jasper Stuyven (Bel) Soudal Quick-Step
8. Mathieu van der Poel (Ned) Alpecin-Premier Tech
9. Matteo Trentin (Ita) Tudor Pro Cycling
10. Edoardo Zambanini (Ita) Bahrain Victorious, all at same time

Everything glitters inside the hall of Vienna’s Hotel Sacher – chandeliers overhead, polished marble underfoot, and bouquets festooning every corner. Rooms here start at £550 a night. It is, by any measure, a grand setting – which makes it feel faintly absurd to be discussing the rough, muddy farm tracks of northern France. But that’s exactly what I’m doing, because opposite me is Tadej Pogačar, and I’m asking him about one of the few big races he is yet to win: Paris-Roubaix.

We have slipped into a quiet sideroom, off the main hall, and settled into armchairs. “The biggest point is,” says Pogačar, leaning forwards, “the faster you go on the cobbles, the easier they are.” Moments earlier he was on stage announcing his new ambassadorship with crypto exchange KuCoin, but it’s clear he’s more comfortable talking about bike racing. Dressed in a white shirt and navy check jacket, his hair freshly clipped into a neat short-back-and-sides, he looks disarmingly young, almost like a school-leaver eager to make a good impression at his first job interview. Yet, at 27, there is only one position he is still seeking: that of the greatest cyclist of all time.

In fact, Pogačar’s CV is now so comprehensive that it’s easier to list the races he hasn’t won – the ones that now most motivate him. Already a four-time Tour de France winner and double world champion, the glaring omissions are Paris-Roubaix and Milan-San Remo, the two remaining Monuments missing from his palmarès. Only three riders in history have collected the full set of five – Milan-San Remo, the Tour of Flanders, Paris-Roubaix, Liège-Bastogne-Liège and Il Lombardia – and they’re all Belgian: Eddy Merckx, Rik van Looy and Roger De Vlaeminck. Could Pogačar become the first rider in nearly half a century to join them? And if so, would it confirm his status as the best cyclist there has ever been?

For Pogačar, racking up all five Monuments is a “challenge” that keeps his career fresh. “I won some races, and it doesn’t feel the same [to win them again] because you’ve already put a tick on them,” he tells me. Of the other three Monuments, he’s won Liège three times, Flanders twice, and Il Lombardia a record five times in a row. When a journalist asked him last year to choose between a hypothetical fifth Tour title or a first Paris-Roubaix, the Slovenian opted for the latter. Now he’s trying to make it a reality. “Well, at least this year I’ve had it in mind since last year,” he smiles.

Pogačar’s Roubaix debut last spring, announced just two weeks before the race, was one of the sport’s most talked-about topics in years. Roubaix director Thierry Gouvenou called it “a huge moment for cycling”. In fact, the world champion’s presence alone made history, when he became the first reigning Tour champion since Greg LeMond in 1991 to start the race. But while LeMond finished a lowly 55th, Pogačar placed second. What did he learn from it? “It’s a f***ing hard race,” Pogačar laughs. “When I did it as a junior [finishing 30th in 2015 and 13th in 2016], I was like, ‘Damn, I don’t want to do this ever again because it’s just so hard’… If I compare my Roubaix power file [from 2025] – I know I changed the bike in the last hour, but still, up to that point, my power numbers were more impressive than in any other race.”

His attacks in last April’s race began with over 100km remaining. By 50km to go, it had come down to a duel between Pogačar and the defending champion Mathieu van der Poel, the script seemingly written for a velodrome shoot-out. The Slovenian appeared to be as assured on the jagged cobbles as he was in the mountains of France. Then came an error – small but decisive. Tracking a camera motorbike into a sharp right-hander, Pogačar misjudged his line, braked too hard too late, and tipped off into the dirt, scrambling as Van der Poel rode away. It was precisely the scenario his team had feared.

Speaking ahead of the race, his UAE boss Mauro Gianetti told La Gazzetta dello Sport that he didn’t want his leader to compete, for fear a crash would “jeopardise” the Tour. Looking back now, Pogačar understands the concern. “Obviously, if I’m the manager of the team, I also don’t want to risk everything in the pre-Tour, because in 2023, I was not ready because of a crash [at Liège-Bastogne-Liège]. As we know, touch wood” – he taps his knuckles against his forehead – “it can happen so quickly in Roubaix, or any other race. The stress is always there, [the risk of being] out for the main goal of the season, but you need to accept it.” That second place, he says, shifted the mood. “When I came second, they saw maybe we have a chance to win another Monument.”

As such, preparations for this spring have been more focused. Rather than tagging on a first recon to his Flanders prep in February as he did in 2025, Pogačar began his visits to northern France two months earlier, riding 160km across the cobbles in December. He plans to go back at least once more before the mid-April race weekend. Course familiarity helps – Magnus Bäckstedt said he did “three, if not four” recons the year he won, 2004 – but Pogačar knows power and tactics will unlock the title.

“For me, it’s really tough to make the difference,” he says. Without any climbs on which to launch one of his trademark attacks, how does he plan to win? “Maybe the best [thing] would be to attack with surprise, but I don’t think I can do that anymore. Everybody’s looking at me,” he says. “I’ll just go with the flow, see where the race takes me, and try to gamble for the final maybe, with a small group sprint. I know after such a tough race I can do, for me, a solid sprint. There’s always a chance.”

It’s hard to believe that, for a rider who has won his last five races with solo attacks averaging 55km, Pogačar’s plan is to rely on his sprint. But the more I think about it, the more sense it makes. After all, he’ll likely have tested his dash three weeks earlier at Milan-San Remo, the race familiarly known as the ‘sprinters’ classic’. If it can work there, why not double down; refine the kick for both? Whatever Van der Poel can do, Pogačar can at least attempt to do better.

At over 300km long, and mostly as flat as a carpenter’s workbench, San Remo is widely regarded as the easiest Monument to finish but the hardest to win. Pogačar has previously said it’s the race that will “send me to the grave”; in five participations, he’s finished 12th, fifth, fourth, and twice third. The trend shows he’s getting closer, but still, he says, finding the podium’s top step is “really tricky – these days, the climbs, I would not call them climbs anymore, because we go so fast on the Cipressa [at 22km to go] and Poggio [at 6km to go] that the draft there is so important.” As at Roubaix, there is no dependable launchpad. There’s a reason why nobody has won from a Cipressa attack since Gabriele Colombo in 1996.

Even when UAE Team Emirates-XRG ramped up the pace on the climb last year, Van der Poel and Ineos Grenadiers’ Filippo Ganna managed to hang on, and both beat Pogačar in the sprint.

“For me, it’s hard to make a difference,” the world champion says, returning to a refrain he used for Roubaix. “But I will keep trying. It’s one challenge that keeps me going. I haven’t succeeded in winning yet, and I’m getting closer. I still have a few years left to try it out.”

Let’s imagine that Pogačar does win both races – picture him sprinting to victory on San Remo’s Via Roma and in Roubaix’s outdoor velodrome. What will it mean for his legacy? He’s the greatest rider of his generation, the Giro-Tour-Worlds treble in 2024 proved as much, but also the greatest of all time? He’ll have won all of cycling’s major crowns (bar the Vuelta a España and Olympics) and in a more competitive, professionalised era than that dominated by Eddy Merckx.

I remind Pogačar of what he said in an interview with L’Équipe two years ago – that he wanted to be “the best in history”. He scrunches his face slightly and claims he never said the line – “maybe they twisted the words a little bit” – but the point seems to stand nonetheless. “I wouldn’t mind going for it,” he says, and pre-empts a Merckx parallel. “There is so much talk about me and comparing [me] to Eddy etc. For me, it’s complete nonsense,” he says. “I like to live in the moment, in the present, not thinking too much about records.” He steers the legacy theme towards his youth team, Pogi Team, and charity, the Tadej Pogačar Foundation. “Maybe the results are not everything that I want people [to remember me for],” he says.

From many riders, a claim they are not hung up on results can sound like protective deflection. From Pogačar, it feels credible. He is driven, and hungry for new titles, intent on improving year after year, but, as he puts it, “will not lose any sleep over it”. At a press day in December he told reporters that, contrary to the narrative they were eager to build, he’s “not obsessed” with winning Roubaix or San Remo. And when a reporter asked when he would win them, he firmly corrected them: “If I win these races…”

What if both races continue to elude him – does it really matter? “I came close, but I’m yet so far,” he says. “If it happens, it happens. If not, I will live my life the same as I do now.” This laconic acceptance may be Pogačar’s greatest advantage. It is what allows him to chase races that do not naturally suit him – Paris-Roubaix chief among them – with curiosity rather than desperation, ambition unclouded by anxiety. As our allotted interview time runs out, he stands up, wanders over to a nearby marble-topped table and helps himself to three unhurried forkfuls of chocolate cake. Five Monuments or not, he seems entirely at ease with the uncertainty. Greatness, for him, is something to be savoured.

This feature first appeared in Cycling Weekly magazine on 12 March 2026. Subscribe now and never miss an issue.

The knee injury that almost saw Tadej Pogačar retire from last year's Tour de France was triggered by a shunt with a Visma-Lease a Bike team car, the Slovenian's agent has said.

The knee injury incurred by UAE Team Emirates-XRG's Pogačar in the final stages of the last year's race – which he went on to win – has been well documented. But the fact it was caused by a collision with the team car of his main rival Jonas Vingegaard had not been revealed before now. Speaking on the Domestique Hotseat podcast, Alex Carera described how the "crazy" incident took place just ahead of stage 18 to Courchevel.

“When he goes against the car of Visma, he’s really unlucky because it’s a crazy situation,” Carera said. “After that of course he’s worried because he doesn’t feel well.”

Beyond getting Pogačar better, the priority became ensuring that other teams did not get wind of his weakness. “It was my job to protect him so this information didn’t go out,” Carera said. “If other teams knew he had an injury, the tactics could change and become more aggressive.”

There was a point, says Carera, when it was not certain that Pogačar would be able to continue. It would appear he remained in the race by a whisker.

In the daily press conference following the Courchevel stage, Pogačar admitted that he could not wait for the race to finish. "I ask myself why I'm still here," he said. "It's so long these three weeks. You count the kilometres to Paris and yes, I can't wait for it to be over so I can do some other nice stuff in my life as well."

These most recent revelations add new context to those comments, which were unusually gloomy for the usually cheerful character.

The story does not end there though. Pogačar's team-mate Tim Wellens puts a different spin on the issue, insisting that the knee problem flared up the day before on a wet stage 17 to Valence.

“It was so bad that he even went down to the race doctor," Wellens said in L'Equipe in November. "After that stage, he went to the hospital for a number of tests. That’s where they discovered the inflammation, but nobody knew! I was certain the news was going to leak out. Withdrawing was seriously considered. It was therefore a huge relief that Tadej didn’t give up in the mountains. After the Tour de France, we were worried about his physical condition.”

Perhaps one incident exacerbated the other, but what seems to be beyond any doubt is that Pogačar was suffering with a problematic knee injury in the final stages of last year's Tour.

If his rivals had known, we may have seen a different finale, but the fact that the Slovenian and his team managed to keep it a secret is indicative of his own professionalism and that of the tight knit group around him.

Forget Tirreno-Adriatico, forget Strade Bianche post-race hot takes, all everyone is talking about online this week is Jonas Vingegaard. In a rain-soaked fourth stage of Paris-Nice, the Visma-Lease a Bike rider’s unique bib-over-jersey combination has shaken the internet. From the bemused to the horrified, the reactions have been epic.

Plus, this fashion scandal has revealed a cornerstone of the cycling world that had hitherto gone unnoticed by me: the Velominati rules. 95 guidelines for road cyclists, from road rules to the importance of bike maintenance and cleanliness.

Jonas Vingegaard has, by the sounds of it, broken one of the manual's most sacrosanct: know what to wear. On the other hand, does a wardrobe shake-up always have to be headline news? Kudos to him, I say.

1. Potholes are everywhere. They are inescapable.

2. "Nothing tastes as good as skinny feels." We've all grown up hearing it, but Lorena Wiebes and the women of the peloton are proving that strength blasts that old saying out of the water.

3. Out with the old, in with the new: “squats for watts” is the mantra we’ll be taking into training this year.

4. Two dopamine triggers collide: good old fashioned slow-release endorphins and that deliciously *bad* doom scroll bliss. Not sure I’ve felt this personally attacked for a while - respect the ingenuity though.

5. Bit of gravel, bit of track, bit of cobbles - and pastries. This is two days with UAE Team Emirates-XRG riders Tadej Pogačar and Florian Vermeersch. Paris-Roubaix incoming...

6. Hard, dusty work at Strade Bianche last week. Bjorn Koerdt, a 21-year-old rider for Picnic PostNL finished 37th in the race

7. It was disco ball turbo training sessions for cross-country athlete, Evie Richards this week as she celebrated her 29th birthday.

8. Now for the reaction we’ve all been waiting for: Jonas Vingegaard’s fashion faux pas. This one made me laugh out loud. Vingegaard arrested for breaking rule 18 of the Veluminati code: know what to wear.

9. An outfit so bad, even us amateurs could replicate it. All we need are a pair of finishing trousers and a yellow bike - easy?

10. This content creator has taken a harder-line approach. “In case we’re confused, this is a no.”

There's pressure, and then there's the pressure of being a promising young French bike racing star. But Paul Seixas is showing no sign of crumbling under the weight of generations of Gallic fans, who have been waiting with varying degrees of patience for a Tour de France champion to follow in the footsteps of 1985 winner (and France's most recent male winner) Bernard Hinault.

At Strade Bianche on Saturday, Seixas's ride to second place behind Tadej Pogačar (UAE Team Emirates-XRG) – no yawning at the back – was arguably the performance of the race. His arrival at the Piazza del Campo in Siena was greeted with more fanfare than that of the Slovenian, despite the latter's attempts to rouse the crowd with a theatrical bow on the finish line.

It wasn't that the crowd wasn't impressed with Pogačar, who demonstrated the kind of form that may well have delivered a first, crushing, psychological blow to Tour de France rivals like Jonas Vingegaard (Visma-Lease a Bike) and Remco Evenepoel (Red Bull-Bora-hansgrohe). It was more that they had seen this all before and, in any case, the race had essentially ended around, ooh, 78km earlier.

In the case of Seixas, the 19-year-old Lyonnais, it was a performance that many fans only dared to dream he could accomplish, and that showed. Of course, a Seixas win would really have been out of this world. But for a rider so young, who only registered his first pro win in February, and with so much expected of him, to beat some of the best riders in the world in one of the biggest races, this really was an exceptional performance.

He came in alone, a minute behind Pogačar, having dropped Giro d'Italia star (and Pogi's team-mate) Isaac del Toro on the final climb into Siena – that alone is some achievement.

Seixas himself displays the kind of bullish confidence that helps make some top riders unstoppable.

"It's a superb second place," he said afterwards. "The whole team did a tremendous job to put me in the best positions, but the race was chaotic at times and I had to make an extra effort that cost me some energy. That's what I lacked to catch up with Pogačar when he attacked, despite my efforts. Then there was no one to work with me. So I tried to make the race tougher and gave it my all until the end to get that second place. I'm very happy, it's really extraordinary."

How things progress from here remains to be seen but he will certainly take heart from his Tuscan performance. There is much speculation about Seixas riding the Tour de France; it's yet to be confirmed but it does feel as though that will be one arena in which the Frenchman is likely to be happy to approach with a learning mindset. With maybe just a stage win along the way…

The sun beats down on reddish stucco and brick around the edge of the Piazza del Campo. A crowd gathers in the middle of the square, as it has for various reasons over centuries. People lean out of their balconies overlooking the historic centre of Siena, revealing glittering Renaissance interiors within, a glimpse into another life.

This could be a scene from any point over the 800 years it has stood at the heart of the Tuscan city, but this Piazza, built as if it is a stage, an amphitheatre, is the host of the finish of Strade Bianche. It is fitting that the beautiful race ends in a gem like Siena.

Peering down on the square from the balcony, there are a few things that give 2026 and a modern bike race away: big screens, an electronic finish line gantry, a large tent hosting VIPs, and the pumping Euro-pop which is inescapable all afternoon. However, even the advertising banners are Tuscan red, with effort made to make the race fit in, the same colour as the restaurant awnings.

Inside the Piazza, away from the chaos of the white gravel roads, things are serene, until the riders themselves thunder in. You can hear the crowd on the Via Santa Caterina first, especially when Elisa Longo Borghini was in the ascendence at the end of the women's race. Then the gladiators emerge into their arena, and it becomes clear just how tough the race has been. Riders like Kasia Niewiadoma Phinney, second again, for a fourth time, collapse to the floor, both through physical and emotional exhaustion.

Tom Pidcock rolls in and composes himself before speaking to the media, others have faces caked in dust and grime, while a few more have bloodied wounds to show for their effort.

The women's and men's races end in remarkably different fashions. The former sees a four-way sprint all the way into Siena, with Elise Chabbey proving most adept at finding the right line to take into the final 300m. Niewiadoma is distanced, but Chabbey barely celebrates, unable to comprehend what has just happened, or just giving it all to the line. The roar of the crowd feels gladiatorial, although it has a slightly deflated edge, after Longo Borghini finished fourth.

Three hours later, ahead of schedule due to a race completed at blistering speed, Tadej Pogačar enters the Piazza del Campo alone. The Slovenian has time, a minute in fact, to sit up, to drink in all the vibes. He has been here before, his fourth title, the third in a row. The conqueror of the gravel, and well, everyone, unclipped, and took a bow after the finish line. It felt like an exhibition, juxtaposed against the thrilling conclusion to the women's race hours earlier.

What was more interesting was the reaction to Paul Seixas crossing the line, a minute after the winner. While there had been acclaim for Pogačar, there was louder applause for the young Frenchman, with the crowd warmly welcoming the next generation. While Pogačar remains unbeatable for now, especially on the white roads of Tuscany, there was a sense that the future is here, and it was welcomed.

Pogačar's dominance is impressive, and is not something we should get bored of, but the nature of the race changes when the final hour is filled with sarcastic comments over the gap narrowing, as opposed to the excitement of a grand denouement.

Strade Bianche remains, though, as a great spectacle, a race so good that it seems silly that the men's race is only 20 years old, and the women's race has only existed since 2016. In the medieval Piazza del Campo, it feels like an event that has existed forever.

As the shutters closed around the Piazza and the restaurants put out thier usual tables, the barriers being taken down, the only feeling left was wonder. Oh, and frustration that we have to wait 12 more months for the next thrilling edition.

Tadej Pogačar made a 78km solo and record-breaking fourth Strade Bianche victory look like a simple café ride, as he opened his season masterfully on Saturday.

The world champion attacked on the Monte Sante Marie gravel sector – as he did in 2024 – shortly after the midway point of the Italian one-day Classic.

For a moment, last year’s runner-up Tom Pidcock (Pinarello Q36.5) followed, but fell victim to an untimely chain drop. Nineteen-year-old French phenom Paul Seixas (Decathlon CMA CGM) then tried to chase, marked by Pogačar’s UAE Team Emirates-XRG team-mate Isaac del Toro, before the Slovenian kicked again and floated away alone.

Immediately after he crossed the line in Siena's Piazza del Campo, Pogačar climbed off his bike, punched the air, and bowed.

His victory – clocked at a race record average speed of 42.7kph – means he is now the only rider in Strade Bianche's two-decade history to win four times. In doing so, he surpassed a record he previously shared with Fabian Cancellara, a three-time winner. Pogačar has also won the event three years in a row.

In the duel for second, Seixas dropped Del Toro on the Via Santa Caterina climb into the piazza to round out an impressive Strade Bianche debut.

Asked about the moment he rode away from the young Frenchman, Pogačar said: "I saw that he was chasing really hard on the steepest part of the climb on Sante Marie. I said to myself, 'I will go all-out to the top, then I will see if he can bridge; either he will come or he will explode, make a gap.' In the end, I saw it was enough.”

Seixas was the last rider to see the rainbow bands before the podium ceremony. As he rampaged across Tuscany's sterrati, Pogačar's advantage stretched to almost two minutes; it only fell to one minute at the very end, by which time the world champion had slowed to savour the final climb, high-fiving his old coach at the bottom, and smiling as he scaled the empty road, flanked by thousands of fans.

"Probably I always say this, but chapeau to my team-mates today. Everyone did an incredible job," Pogačar said.

The world champion's next goals lie in a run of Monuments, two of which – Milan-San Remo and Paris-Roubaix – remain bucket-list races for him.

"It’s a great start to the season," he said of his history-making Strade Bianche victory. "Today was the first day of the year. We go day by day, race by race, and see how it goes."

The last time Pogačar opened his season with a win at the Italian Classic, in 2024, he went on to enjoy his most successful year to date, winning the Giro d'Italia, Tour de France and UCI World Championships – cycling's Triple Crown. Another year of supremacy surely awaits.

Results

Strade Bianche (203km): Siena > Siena

1. Tadej Pogačar (Slo) UAE Team Emirates-XRG, in 4:45:15
2. Paul Seixas (Fra) Decathlon CMA CGM, +1:00
3. Isaac del Toro (Mex) UAE Team Emirates-XRG, +1:09
4. Romain Grégoire (Fra) Groupama-FDJ United, +2:04
5. Gianni Vermeersch (Bel) Red Bull-Bora-hangrohe, at same time
6. Jan Christen (Sui) UAE Team Emirates-XRG, +2:07
7. Tom Pidcock (GBr) Pinarello Q36.5, +2:14
8. Matteo Jorgenson (USA) Visma-Lease a Bike, +2:20
9. Andreas Kron (Den) Uno-X Mobility, +3:46
10. Wout van Aert (Bel) Visma-Lease a Bike, at same time

It's Paris-Roubaix with hard, hard hills; a Grand Tour gravel epic on steroids; it's an Ardennes Classic with off-road elements. It's Strade Bianche, and once again it looks set to be a thriller.

It's a race with so many tasty ingredients that many feel it ought to join the list of Monuments that sit at the top of the one-day racing tree.

Both men's and women's races run on the same day, Saturday 7 March, and will feature some of cycling's biggest names. This year's races feature a slightly shorter course and, in the case of the men's event, significantly less gravel with the hope of producing a more competitive event – Tadej Pogačar has one the last two editions with long solo attacks.

Here are a few things we're really looking forward to this weekend, at what will be the second big European Classic of the season. We are salivating at the prospect already.

King vs Pretender: Paul Seixas takes on Tadej Pogačar

The ruler must now face the young pretender. Pogačar (UAE Team Emirates-XRG) will go into the race as favourite, but as many eyes will surely be on French upstart Paul Seixas (Decathlon CMA CRG), who has been making waves already this season with a series of impressive wins that bely his 19 years.

Neither rider's recent results on paper tell the whole story, for Slovenia's Pogačar has yet to turn a pedal in anger this year and we have little concrete indication of his form. In the case of Seixas – he only took his first pro victory a fortnight ago, and that was at .Pro level – a WorldTour race like Strade Bianche is a step up.

In reality though, we can all be forgiven for presuming when it comes to Tadej Pogačar. The past two seasons have seen him imperious and almost unbeatable in races like this, not to mention he won Strade Bianche in both of those years. As for Seixas, it is his young age and the panache with which he has taken his two wins this season – in particular the one-day Faun Ardèche, where he won solo from long range with a 1:48 gap – that demand we take notice.

Speaking on this week's Watts Occurring podcast with Geraint Thomas, Seixas's DS at Decathlon CMA CGM Luke Rowe had this to say about him:

"He's legit. In the meeting before the race, that's what he said he was going to do. And if you look at the guys he rode off his wheel, if you look at the top 10… they're legit guys. This guy [Seixas] is special… 'F*** me, he's special. He's super professional, lovely bloke – just down to earth. He's still a kid, he's just a jolly kid riding his bike. He doesn't think about the consequences, he just goes and races. He just wants to win everything, smash everyone… he's a special guy."

With a near-190km distance and 11 classified climbs, the Faun Ardèche was not so different to Strade Bianche, minus the strength-sapping white roads, of course. The chances of him riding away from the entire field at Tuscany are slim, but it will be fascinating to watch him go toe to toe with the very best, and on the biggest of stages.

Will Demi Vollering and Lotte Kopecky extend their streak?

The past four editions of the women's race – the Strade Bianche Donne – have seen the spoils shared between Lotte Kopecky (SD Worx-Protime) and Demi Vollering (FDJ United-Suez). These are arguable the two best riders in the women's peloton and Strade Bianche offers up the perfect platform where either of these riders, with their own particular abilities, can win. Since Kopecky's first win in 2022, they've taken it in turns, with Vollering the current defending champion.

Both women return again, with Dutchwoman Vollering looking in great form following a run of great results at the Setmana Valenciana – where she took two stages and the overall win; and Omloop Nieuwsblad – which she won. Kopecky, on the other hand, suffered a mechanical at Omloop, which is her one race so far this season, and was unable to capitalise on what she said were good feelings.

Vollering and Kopecky are unlikely to have things all their own way of course – see below for some of the other riders who have the ability to challenge for the win at Strade Bianche Donne.

Shorter, smoother, more open, but still brutal

The organiser of Strade Bianche, RCS, has shortened the course for both men and women, and taken gravel sectors out, with the aim of making the race more open. For the men, the distance is reduced from from 215 to 205km, and, in the men's race, removed two-and-a-half sectors of sterrati, bringing the amount of gravel in the event down by 18km. There is less removed in the women's race on both counts, with the distance reduced by just three kilometres to 133km. Two sectors of sterrati have also been removed in the early stages, making for a 16km reduction.

It feels like this was done with half an eye on Pogačar more than anything else, perhaps to rein in those long-range attacks that have become his trademark and can have the effect of nullifying a race after little more than the halfway mark, in extreme cases. However, the changes have been made in the first half, with the tough and hilly finale left in.

Challengers to the throne

Strade Bianche is about far more than just Tadej Pogacar and Paul Seixas, or Demi Vollering and Lotte Kopecky. In the men's event, Tom Pidcock (Pinarello-Q36.5) will be taking the start. The Brit won the race in 2023 and has been among the best of the rest behind Pogačar in the two races since – last year, in fact, he was second. Pidcock loves this race and will be lining up with nothing on his mind but winning.

The provisional startlist also features Ben Healy (EF Education-EasyPost), he of the impressive breakaways at last year's Tour de France; Quinn Simmons (Lidl-Trek), who pushed Pogacar hard in another hilly Classic – Il Lombardia – last year; and Wout van Aert (Visma-Lease a Bike), who will be looking forward to turning the tables on a run of recent bad luck.

In the women's race, Kasia Niewiadoma (Canyon-SRAM zondacrypto) heads up the challenge from riders whose surname is not Vollering or Kopecky. She has come second here three times (the last time being 2018) but the 2024 Tour de France Femmes avec Zwift winner is still more than capable of winning the race. A recent second at Omloop suggests she's in great form.

Elsewhere Pauline Ferrand-Prevot (Visma-Lease a Bike) will make her season debut here. Her third place here last year – not to mention the fact she is the reigning Tour de France Femmes champ – suggests she is well capable of winning on the right day. Finally, Shirin van Anrooij will head up the Lidl-Trek squad. The young Dutch rider is yet to amass many wins but has a previous fifth place here (2024).

The full start list for the men's Strade Bianche this Saturday has now been confirmed, with a mixture of headline riders, past winners and debutants.

Among those expected to light up the race are the defending champion Tadej Pogačar (UAE Team Emirates-XRG), last year's runner-up Tom Pidcock (Q36.5 Pro Cycling), and 19-year-old Paul Seixas (Decathlon CMA CGM), who is widely touted as French cycling's emerging hope.

Alongside Pogačar, winner of three of the last four editions, and Pidcock, who won in 2023, there are also two other previous winners on the start list: Wout van Aert (Visma-Lease a Bike, 2020) and Julian Alaphilippe (Tudor Pro Cycling, 2019).

Around 60 riders of the 175-strong field will be making their debut on Strade Bianche's white gravel roads on 7 March. The youngest among them is Mattia Stenico (Bardiani CSF 7 Saber), who was born two days before Seixas.

The full start list for the event, released on Thursday by organiser RCS and including rider numbers, is below. There are 25 teams, each made up of seven riders. The names are subject to change.

Strade Bianche 2026 start list

UAE Team Emirates-XRG

1. Tadej Pogačar
2. Jan Christen
3. Isaac Del Toro
4. Felix Großschartner
5. Domen Novak
6. Kevin Vermaerke
7. Florian Vermeersch

Alpecin–Premier Tech

11. Tibor Del Grosso
12. Francesco Busatto
13. Aaron Dockx
14. Gal Glivar
15. Michael Gogl
16. Edward Planckaert
17. Emiel Verstrynge

Bahrain-Victorious

21. Matej Mohorič
22. Pello Bilbao
23. Fran Miholjević
24. Pau Miquel
25. Afonso Oliveira Eulálio
26. Attila Valter
27. Edoardo Zambanini

Bardiani CSF 7 Saber

31. Filippo Magli
32. Martin Marcellusi
33. Alessio Martinelli
34. Luca Paletti
35. Mattia Stenico
36. Alex Tolio
37. Filippo Turconi

Decathlon CMA CGM

41. Paul Seixas
42. Pierre Gautherat
43. Noa Isidore
44. Antoine L’Hôte
45. Jordan Labrosse
46. Paul Lapeira
47. Gregor Mühlberger

EF Education–EasyPost

51. Ben Healy
52. Vincenzo Albanese
53. Richard Carapaz
54. Mikkel Honoré
55. Lukas Nerurkar
56. James Shaw
57. Michael Valgren

Groupama–FDJ United

61. Valentin Madouas
62. Clément Braz Alfonso
63. Tom Donnenwirth
64. Kévin Geniets
65. Lorenzo Germani
66. Romain Grégoire
67. Brieuc Rolland

Ineos Grenadiers

71. Jack Haig
72. Lucas Hamilton
73. Kim Heiduk
74. Axel Laurance
75. Brandon Smith Rivera
76. Artem Shmidt
77. Connor Swift

Lidl–Trek

81. Albert Withen Philipsen
82. Andrea Bagioli
83. Patrick Konrad
84. Bauke Mollema
85. Jacopo Mosca
86. Quinn Simmons
87. Matteo Sobrero

Lotto Intermarché

91. Jarrad Van Eetvelt
92. Simone Gualdi
93. Mathieu Kockelmann
94. Liam Slock
95. Reuben Thompson
96. Jenno Berckmoes
97. Matthew Fox

MBH Bank–CSB Telecom Fort

101. Marcin Budziński
102. Luca Cretti
103. Márton Dina
104. Alessandro Fancellu
105. Lorenzo Nespoli
106. Alessandro Verre
107. Samuele Zoccarato

Movistar

111. Pavel Novák
112. Roger Adrià
113. Albert Torres
114. Filip Maciejuk
115. Manlio Moro
116. Diego Pescador
117. Gonzalo Serrano

NSN Cycling Team

121. George Bennett
122. Pier-André Côté
123. Pau Martí
124. Krists Neilands
125. Alessandro Pinarello
126. Nick Schultz
127. Flors Van Tricht

Q36.5 Pro Cycling Team

131. Tom Pidcock
132. Xabier Mikel Azparren
133. Mark Donovan
134. Brent Van Moer
135. Quinten Hermans
136. Xandro Meurisse
137. Milan Vader

Red Bull–BORA–Hansgrohe

141. Gianni Vermeersch
142. Mattia Cattaneo
143. Emil Herzog
144. Gianni Moscon
145. Giulio Pellizzari
146. Adrien Boichis
147. Ben Zwiehoff

Solution Tech–Nippo–Rali

151. Franklin Archibold
152. Alexandre Balmer
153. Luca Verrando
154. Ben Granger
155. Alessandro Iacchi
156. Tommaso Nencini
157. Andrea Piras

Soudal Quick-Step

161. Filippo Zana
162. Gianmarco Garofoli
163. Junior Lecerf
164. Pepijn Reinderink
165. Martin Svrček
166. Louis Vervaeke
167. Mauri Vansevenant

Team Jayco AlUla

171. Filippo Conca
172. Alessandro Covi
173. Dries De Bondt
174. Davide De Pretto
175. Anders Foldager
176. Alan Hatherly
177. Andrea Vendrame

Team Picnic PostNL

181. Mattia Gaffuri
182. James Knox
183. Robbe Dhondt
184. Matthew Dinham
185. Alexy Faure Prost
186. Bjorn Koerdt
187. Oliver Peace

Team Polti VisitMalta

191. Adrián Benito
192. Gabriele Bessega
193. Aidan Buttigieg
194. Dario Giuliano
195. Francisco Muñoz
196. Andrea Pietrobon
197. Diego Pablo Sevilla

Team Visma-Lease a Bike

201. Wout Van Aert
202. Filippo Fiorelli
203. Tijmen Graat
204. Matteo Jorgenson
205. Timo Kielich
206. Pietro Mattio
207. Tim Rex

Tudor Pro Cycling Team

211. Julian Alaphilippe
212. Roland Thalmann
213. Yannis Voisard
214. Lawrence Warbasse
215. Fabian Weiss
216. Hannes Wilksch
217. Luc Wirtgen

Unibet Rose Rockets

221. Wout Poels
222. Cedrik Christophersen
223. Odd Christian Eiking
224. Owen Geleijn
225. Jelle Johannink
226. Lander Loockx
227. Clément Venturini

Uno-X Mobility

231. Tobias Halland Johannessen
232. Markus Hoelgaard
233. Ådne Holter
234. Anders Halland Johannessen
235. Andreas Kron
236. Fredrik Dversnes Lavik
237. Anders Skaarseth

XDS Astana Team

241. Alberto Bettiol
242. Clément Champoussin
243. Anton Kuzmin
244. Marco Schrettl
245. Guillermo Thomas Silva
246. Davide Toneatti
247. Simone Velasco

Tom Pidcock's coach Kurt Bogaerts has said that the presence of Tadej Pogačar is something to be accepted and relished as a challenge, rather than something to complain about.

The Pinarello-Q36.5 head of performance was speaking to Dutch outlet Wielerflits about the Briton's approach to this weekend's Strade Bianche – a race that he won back in 2023 but which UAE Team Emirates-XRG rider Pogačar has made his own for the past two seasons.

"You're going to face him in all the big races, right?" Bogaerts said of the Slovenian. "So you have to deal with that. You have to try to be really good yourself and then see how you can battle him. I think something is definitely possible. If we aim for a good result, the rest will follow. We shouldn't complain. It's only good for the sport that Pogačar is interested in a wide range of races. Honestly, I like that."

He was responding to a comment suggesting it did not matter how well prepared Pidcock was, he would still have to face the defending champion.

Bogaerts added: "Last year, Tom went first. Not necessarily with the intention of anticipating, but mainly to play to his own strengths. Tom has a good sense of his capabilities, and then it's a matter of waiting to see how the opposition reacts. We're going to try to do that again. We're not averse to taking action ourselves, but we might end up in a scenario we have to follow."

He said Pidcock was "not losing any sleep" over a disappointing 48th place finish at Omloop Nieuwsblad, where he suffered with the cold after what Bogaerts said were poor clothing choices, and a crash.

"But he still managed to get back to the front from behind the last group. I don't really understand how he managed that… You can't do that if you're not in top form, I think," he said.

He called Strade Bianche "one of the races that [Pidcock] gets out of bed for" and is very passionate about. The Yorkshire rider has already done a recon ride himself, and the whole team is set to do another this week.

Things hadn't really "fallen into place" for Pidcock so far this year, said Bogaerts, with the issues at Omloop and a shortened Vuelta Murcia, for example. But his performance at the Ruta del Sol, where he won a stage, showed he was on good form.

Strade Bianche takes place this Saturday 7 March – if you want to follow the action, check out our streaming guide here.

Colnago today launched a 'Dark' version of the V5RS and Y1RS. The bikes are the very same models available to be used by Tadej Pogačar of UAE Team Emirates-XRG who has already opened its 2026 account with some early success, on board Colnago bikes.

We love both V5RS and Y1RS here at Cycling Weekly, with Rook, our North American Editor, testing the V5RS recently and commending it for its excellent ride characteristics, but we can't help but giggle at the photography provided to show off this latest pairing of bare-carbon finished bikes. I rode a V5RS myself for most of the summer, and absolutely loved it too, but these new photos are quite something.

Here, the strictly limited edition 'Dark' editions, have hands or legs obscuring the images, and the beauty shots we might usually share, showing both bikes in all their glory, are almost comedic in the context of a set of launch photos. You just can't see the bikes.

But that's perhaps the point. Tadej Pogačar dispensed with the paint on his bikes, not caring what they looked like either, ordering the team to shed every gram so he could bring the Y1RS into service at every stage of last year's Tour De France. They take things so seriously at that level that perhaps it doesn’t matter if you can’t see them.

You could argue that the V5RS is used to not being seen however, having been left in the truck like a two-wheeled Cinderella, for almost every competition last season. Perhaps as a result, it is now intriguingly being billed as being "the perfect tool for amateurs who want to feel fast on climbs," which I feel somewhat understates its broader capability as an excellent professional-level race bike, even if Tadej seems to prefer the slipperier one.

It's not all dark, however. Chrome-plated decals in a "titanium tone" pick out both the Ace of Clubs emblem on the head tube and the Colnago logo on the down tube. You can just about pick that out in some of the photos.

While lights were used sparingly in the studio, so has the necessary protective lacquer to keep the new limited-edition bikes looking on point for their new owners—both models have been coated in the minimum amount of protective coating, just like Tadej's were.

There was no information in the press release pertaining to how much weight the new finish saves, if any, but if you miss out on the bare carbon one, you could always buy the existing black version, painted in the usual way.

We jest of course. The bike's will look superb in the flesh we're sure, but if you want to buy one, or the pair if you've just got to have both, be quick as just 300 of each will be available worldwide, via your friendly local Colnago dealer. If you can spot them.

Pricing is the same as the painted versions and they're on sale now.

The world champion Tadej Pogačar is "excited to get stuck in" on his season debut at Strade Bianche in Italy this Saturday.

UAE Team Emirates-XRG confirmed their roster for the race on Monday evening, including Pogačar and the six riders that will ride alongside him: Isaac Del Toro, Jan Christen, Felix Großschartner, Domen Novak, Florian Vermeersch and Kevin Vermaerke.

The four-time Tour de France champion has won the previous two editions of the race – three in total – crashing into a ditch with 50km to go last year, before attacking to win with an almost minute-and-a-half gap to Tom Pidcock (Pinarello Q36.5).

“Strade is a race where I have unforgettable memories,” Pogačar said in quotes attributed to him on the UAE Team Emirates-XRG website.

“My record there is pretty good and I hope that I will be in a good position again come Saturday. We expect there to be some strong rivals, the startlist is always at a high level for these big races and it should make things exciting for the fans.

“It is my first race of the season, and I hope to have a good start. I’ve been cheering on from the couch until now, so I’m excited to get stuck in myself again and finally race. The team has been on a good wave at the moment with many wins already and we hope to continue that over the next few races.”

The last time Pogačar competed was when he won Il Lombardia last October, almost five months ago. It was his last of 20 victories in 2025, which also included a second Tour of Flanders, a third Liège-Bastogne-Liège, four Tour de France stage wins, and both the world and European road titles.

Among the other riders on the start list for Strade Bianche are previous winners Wout van Aert (Visma-Lease a Bike), Julian Alaphilippe (Tudor Pro Cycling) and Pidcock, last year’s runner-up. There is also growing excitement around 19-year-old Paul Seixas (Decathlon CMA CGM), who is considered in his native France to be the heir to Pogačar’s throne.

This year’s Strade Bianche will be the 20th edition of the one-day race. It takes place in Tuscany, Italy, and counts 14 gravel sectors which cover 64km of the total 201km.

The men’s race will start in Siena at 11:40 local time, 10:40 UK time. It is expected to finish in the same city’s iconic Piazza del Campo around 16:30 local time, 15:30 UK time.

One of the biggest events to have hit the British news cycle this week has been the weather. Spring is here (kind of), and that first burst of blue sky after 40 days of persistent rain felt good.

In the same vein, much of my Instagram newsfeed has been filled with posts highlighting moments of unexpected whimsy at the Winter Olympics, embodied most notably by the figure skater, Alysa Liu. The 20-year-old took gold in a performance dominated by joyful movement and musicality, after retiring from the sport aged 16 to prioritise her mental and physical health. Her triumphant return to the sport has captivated the internet, and kick-started a conversation about the role play and joy have in performance - and success.

This week’s social media offerings show a dose of this newfound interest in the softer side of sport, as riders train under blue skies before a weekend of Belgian races. Enjoy!

1. Tadej Pogačar made a surprise appearance on Greg James’ Radio 1 Breakfast Show this week when Formula 1 driver Ollie Bearman called the Tour de France winner live on air. His advice for the show’s host set to ride 1000km in eight days? "Have fun, eat carbs."

2. Sweaty bib-shorts and the post-ride couch-collapse: a cyclist's paradise? Can't say I'm 100% on board...

3. Sam Watson attempts to describe his teammates in one word.

4. Lotto Intermarché's women's team enjoy an early-spring bluebird day on this team ride on the Belgian cobbles.

5. Lotto Intermarché aren’t the only ones enjoying our recent burst of spring sun over in Belgium. Anna Henderson (Lidl-Trek) is in full training mode ahead of Opening Weekend.

6. Cat Ferguson (Movistar), Imogen Wolff (Visma-Lease a Bike), Imogen Francis (Team Farto - Kiroot) and Alberte Greve (Uno-X Mobility) took a training ride turned trip to France on the hunt for pastries.

7. In a flashback to muddier times, cross-country rider Evie Richards shares a month in her life, full of snowy training rides and cosy home renovations: "I’m just out here wearing every waterproof and base layer I own."

8. Go Daisy! The seven-year-old hill-climber tackled one of Bristol’s steepest climbs last weekend, with a 13.2% average incline. Legend.

9. From a near-vertical Bristol incline to Mathieu van der Poel sprinting uphill - all to the sound of a Pogačar team radio transmission. "I am happy(scared) I motivate you for your trainings," Pogačar wrote in the comments.

10. Other Pogačar fans have been caught in the wilds of Calpe.

10. Ahead of Omloop Nieuwsblad this weekend, help Laboral Kutxa find the perfect tune to open their team presentation. 'The Final Countdown' is currently a commenter favourite. And 'Baby Shark'. What are you choosing?

Tadej Pogačar's UAE Team Emirates-XRG team has taken to shielding him using motorcycle outriders, after a recent string of fan-related incidents.

Fans were looking for social media exposure, UAE team boss Matxin Joxean Fernández told Spanish media outlet AS, but sometimes the consequences could be negative for the pro cyclist involved.

“This is about moments and getting more views, something that's very fashionable these days," Fernández said. "I've seen some very complicated situations where many cyclists, caught up in the excitement, start recording in the middle of the road. If at that moment a cyclist gives you a rude response because you see a car coming towards you when you're encroaching on the opposite lane, the one who probably comes out looking bad is the one who gives that response, when the context is completely different.

"What we see is what we perceive as right or wrong. Sometimes we don't consider the full context of the situation.'

A recent Spanish training camp saw the team post a motorcycle outrider to protect the popular Slovenian and to stop the situation becoming unsafe.

"An example of situations we've had during our training camp in Alicante: we had a motorcycle to protect Tadej, because we ride in small groups," said Fernández. "If you have groups of 20, the cars behind can't overtake them. So we ride in groups of eight, but if cyclists join in, they become too large.

"Now, what we do is put a motorcycle behind Tadej to ensure that the small group is respected and that cars can pass without creating a traffic jam.”

The Tour de France champion posted a ride on his Strava account last week imploring fans to be more respectful, after he was sworn at by a fan who became impatient to have his picture taken with the star. And Pogačar is not the only rider to have fallen foul of fan attention lately – Jonas Vingegaard crashed last month on a training ride while attempting to drop an unwelcome fan on a descent. The Dane then had to miss the UAE Tour.

Finally, Fernández struck what felt like a conciliatory note in an attempt to foster empathy between both sides, saying "we have to put ourselves in each other's shoes".

"If we make a mistake at any point, we apologise," he said. "If, as Tadej said, you're talking and someone asks you for a photo while we're doing this interview, you ask them to wait and they get angry... Who's right? The one who gets angry or the one who asks for two minutes of patience?

"We all have to put ourselves in each other's shoes, as they say in Italian. We have to be willing to apologise and be respectful.”

Tadej Pogačar may have just revealed all of his training power zones in his latest Strava post.

The world champion’s power data has long been the subject of speculation, with some previously estimating his functional threshold power (FTP) to be around 415 watts.

Typically, Pogačar hides his power numbers on his Strava files; however, his latest training ride, shared on Wednesday, in which he called for greater respect from fans, left all the data uncovered to his more than 1 million followers.

According to Strava, and information from the UAE Team Emirates-XRG rider’s power meter, Pogačar averaged 299 watts on his 132km ride from Valencia to Calpe in Spain, at one point reaching a maximum power of 800 watts.

What’s more interesting, though, is the power zones Strava appears to have calculated. According to the platform, Pogačar’s zones are the following:

Zone 1 (recovery): 0-237 watts
Zone 2 (endurance): 238-323 watts
Zone 3 (tempo): 324-387 watts
Zone 4 (threshold): 388-452 watts
Zone 5 (VO2 Max): 453-516 watts
Zone 6 (anaerobic): 517-645 watts
Zone 7 (neuromuscular): 646+ watts

Although this data is split into wide ranges, which may not be completely accurate, the numbers appear to align with previous estimates of Pogačar’s power. The theory that his FTP is 415 watts, for example, seems to coincide with the middle of his ‘threshold’ zone.

Likewise, Pogačar told The Peter Attia Drive Podcast in 2024 that his Zone 2 power, at the time, was between 320 and 340 watts. He added that he can maintain this at a heart rate of around 150 beats per minute. This again appears to support the zones detailed on Strava.

In the same interview, Pogačar warned against being rigid with power zones. "If you're doing a five-hour ride, your zone two after five hours may not be your zone two anymore,” he said. "On the flat you will not recover, and five hours of riding 320-340 [watts] for me also means that the next day I’m not riding my bike. So when going on the flat for longer, I drop my power to 290-300."

The world champion also explained that he finds power meters “unreliable”, due to outside temperatures and possible calibration error, and tends to ride to heart rate. “I’ve been training with a heart rate monitor since I was 12 years old,” he said. “I could go by heart rate only, but it’s always good to compare heart rate to power.”

Strava determines power zones by taking different percentages of a user’s FTP – the highest power in watts a person can maintain for an hour on the bike. Pogačar’s numbers, according to Strava, are based on data from a power meter.

Tadej Pogačar is calling for greater respect from cycling fans after sharing a candid message on Strava describing a rather rude in-person encounter with a fan during today's ride.

The four-time Tour de France winner posed what he described as an "honest question to all fans," recounting a moment when he was approached for a photo while already engaged in conversation.

“If you find me in conversation with someone and you ask me for photo, I ask you to give me two minutes to finish talk. Do you wait 2 minutes or show me middle finger and take off angry?" Pogačar wrote. "Long day ended with losing biggest fan 😢"

While Pogačar did not provide specific details about the incident, the post's tone suggested genuine frustration.

Pogačar is widely regarded as one of the peloton’s most approachable stars, regularly stopping for photos, autographs and brief chats with fans at races and training rides alike. His message, therefore, is more of a reminder than a complaint. Even the most fan-friendly riders expect basic courtesy.

This incident also comes just weeks after Pogačar’s chief rival, Jonas Vingegaard, saw his season preparations disrupted following a crash that was reportedly linked to fan tailing the Dane too closely on a training ride. While the circumstances differ, both situations are part of a larger and ongoing discussion around spectator behaviour and rider welfare.

Incidents involving roadside crowding, phones or signs held into riders’ paths, and over-eager fans running alongside racers have long been flashpoints in professional cycling. But they appear to be growing more frequent.

We have previously reported on a string of high-profile fan incidents, from spectators stepping into the road for photos to projectiles being thrown at riders, including the widely condemned case of a bottle hurled at Mathieu van der Poel during Paris-Roubaix.

What’s more, off-the-bike interactions (or altercations) are increasingly part of the conversation as rider visibility rises beyond race environments.

A beloved aspect of cycling is the unusually close access fans have to the sport’s superstars compared to many other global sports. Informal interactions are part of its cultural fabric, but that proximity can blur boundaries.

While Pogačar’s post may have been born out of frustration, it was delivered with his trademark warmth toward supporters.

“…btw I love you all,” he wrote. “Heck I even like the fans that are not my supporters but don’t have attitude of spoiled teenager.”

ICMY: Fan etiquette was a topic of discussion in a recent episode of our new Off The Back podcast; check it out if you haven't listened yet.

"Do you ever feel like maybe it's not worth it?" Asked Anders Mielke of Mads Pedersen two years ago. An excerpt from this video, included right at the end of this page, was published just days after the Dane fractured his collar bone and wrist at the Volta a la Comunitat Valenciana on Wednesday. Pederson answered, "Yes."

For every good race is the risk that it might end in disaster; in a broken collar bone, in severe burns and skin abrasions, or worse. And the question of rider safety is never far from the industry's collective mind, most recently been embodied in the AeroBag, a self-inflating protection mechanism worn under riders' clothes. Whether they will take the peloton by storm remains to be seen, but the company confirmed to Cycling Weekly that Picnic PostNL and Visma Lease a Bike have received kits and are ready to start testing.

But it's not all serious in this week's social media round up. We've got rider make-overs, artistic tributes to brilliant bikes and Matthew Brennan struggling to see. Eclectic. Enjoy!

1. Tadej Pogačar has been seen sporting a new hair do inspired by his childhood rap hero, Eminem. “Can the real one stand up please?” wrote Mathieu van der Poel in the comments below.

2. Matthew Brennan finished second in the Cadel Evans Great Ocean Road Race on Sunday after launching an early sprint having mistaken a 300m sign for a 200m one. "I felt like I had really good legs there, so I'm just going to get my eyes tested" Brennan joked after the race.

3. After a brief bout of self-depreciation online, Brennan joined the seven-time grand slam winning tennis player Carlos Alcaraz on a plane ride home. Currently ranked first in the world, Alcaraz joined the Brit fresh off the back of his Australian Open win. A good omen for our British star?

4. Movistar also left Australia for rainier places this week. British track champion, Carys Lloyd shared a post celebrating the “many highs and a few lows” of life down under.

5. A few weeks ago, James Shrubsall wrote a piece about the state of the cycling kit industry, after Rapha closed some of its Clubhouses, Le Col lost its founder and Endura staff face redundancies amid a location switch. But have we been asking the wrong questions…?

6. After sustained criticism of Ineos Grenadiers’ questionable white-grey shorts, the team have confirmed that they will be swapping to black for the 'European spring'. Polish national champion and 2024 Tour de France Femmes winner, Kasia Niewiadoma knows something of the white-kit struggle: "One thing I learnt since becoming national champ.. white kit maintenance is nearly as difficult as staying calm when being half wheeled on an easy recovery ride."

7. "Tell us it’s not AI,” pleads the official Giro d’Italia Instagram account next to this video posted by Chris Froome. "Any guesses how many grand tour wins are sitting at this table?"

8. Ever loved a bike so much it made you make art? This illustrator has made a ten-page digital zine dedicated to his electric Surly cargo bike.

9. Biniam Girmay’s Valencia win, live from the NSN team car. Warning: prepare for screaming.

10. "Do you ever feel that it’s not worth it?" Anders Mielke asked Mads Pederson in an interview for the Paris 2024 Olympics. "Yes" he replied. The video was posted a day after the former World Champion fractured his collarbone at the beginning of this month. "Hope to see you back chasing cobbles soon."

Throughout 2025, UAE Team Emirates-XRG won almost 100 races including the Tour de France, Tour de Suisse, multiple classics and three Monuments. While Tadej Pogačar was the most prolific winner on the squad, his teammates still won more than 60 races between them, more than any other team in professional cycling.

It was an incredible feat, one they may be bound to repeat in 2026 given the age of many on their roster. Pogačar is only 27, Isaac Del Toro 22, Joao Almeida 27, and Jan Christen 21.

Just a few weeks into the 2026 season and UAE Team Emirates already have six wins, the most of any professional team. When we analyze their success the first thing that comes to mind is money.

With a bigger budget than most if not all their rivals, they can buy in the best riders and offer the biggest contracts. But talent and budget don't always translate to race wins, which is why good coaching is so important.

When Tim Wellens joined UAE Team Emirates in 2023, he was a solid WorldTour rider with multiple Grand Tour stage victories. Now, he is one of the best Classics riders and domestiques in the world; reliable on all sorts of terrain, and still improving at 34 years old.

Jhonatan Narvaez was an above average rider with INEOS Grenadiers, but after one year on UAE Team Emirates, he has become one of the best puncheurs in the world and a key support rider for Pogačar in the biggest races.

So how do they do it? How does UAE Team Emirates transform these riders from above average racers to some of the strongest cyclists in the world? That's what brought me to Calpe, Spain and an analysis of their training data. While they don't post all of their rides on Strava, they share more than a few secrets. Let's take a closer look.

UAE Team Emirates-XRG’s December Training Camp

Gone are the days of strict Zone 2 training all winter. Now, pros are performing intervals multiple times per week at winter training camps, including VO2 Max and sprint intervals. Here is what an example week looks like at the UAE Team Emirates- December training camp.

• Monday: 4hrs Zone 2
• Tuesday: Gym in the morning + 2hrs Zone 2 in the afternoon
• Wednesday: Aero testing at the velodrome + 4hrs Zone 2
• Thursday: 4.5hrs with 3x10min torque intervals
• Friday: 3hrs Zone 2
• Saturday: 3.5hrs with 3x8min 40/20s Over Unders
• Sunday: 1.5hrs Zone 1 coffee ride

There is a lot of information here, so let’s take it step-by-step. First, we can see that high-intensity intervals are done 2-3 times per week on top of lots of Zone two riding. The intervals are short and sharp, making up only 20-30 minutes out of a four-hour session. There is only one true rest day, with the other “recovery” days being three or four hour endurance rides. So why do they train this way?

While Zone two is a major part of the teams training schedule, it is not their only focus in winter. High intensity intervals help riders stay sharp for the long racing season ahed. Many of them race from February through to October, meaning they need to maintain race shape for almost nine months. Races are also faster, more aggressive, and more meaningful than ever. Riders cannot show up to races at 80% when they are expected to compete for the win in every race.

Year-round intensity can make you fitter and faster purely from a physiological perspective. Of course, you must tread carefully, because high-intensity training can quickly turn into too much of a good thing. It's a lot like the high-carb revolution. Fuel with 40 grams of carbs per hour, and you won't get very far in professional cycling. Start fueling with 120g per hour, and you will be faster and stronger for longer. That means more is better, right?

Try fueling with 400g of carbs per hour and you'll probably end up like Tom Dumoulin pulling down your bibs on the side of the road, or curled up in the fetal position with stomach cramps. That is too much of a good thing, just like high intensity training. If you did 40/20s every day, it would only be a matter of time before you crashed and burned. So what is the perfect balance between high and low intensity training?

Two days of high-intensity interval training per week seems to be the best approach for most cyclists. Highly-trained and experienced riders may be able to handle 3-4 days of intensity per week, depending on the type of intervals and overall training load. But on a regular basis, two days of high-intensity is best.

We must also point out that pros can handle more than amateurs, so we don't recommend copying UAE Team Emirates-XRG workout-for-workout. Their whole lives revolve around cycling – training, nutrition, recovery, massage, physio, sleep, etc. – so they can handle more than us amateurs with jobs and family responsibilities. There is a lot of value in what Pogačar and his teammates do, so let's take a look at their workouts first, and then we can see how we can try it ourselves.

UAE Team Emirates key Workouts

There are two workouts that nearly every UAE Team Emirages rider does on a regular basis: 40/20s and torque work. We’ll dive into the details of those sessions below, but we also have to mention a never-before-seen workout posted by none other than Tadej Pogačar. Here are the workouts:

1. Torque Bursts: 7x (4min @ 70% into 35sec at 130% and 50 rpm into 15sec high cadence sprint)

Pogačar posted this workout only a few weeks ago, and it is one of the toughest torque sessions we have seen. There are seven repeats of high-torque intervals at VO2 Max power immediately followed by a 15-second sprint. You can see Pogačar’s speed and cadence throughout each effort, fluctuating between 20-35 kph on a steep gradient. In between each interval, aim for high Zone 2 power rather than complete recovery.

2. 40/20s Over Unders: 3x8min 40/20s (40sec at 115% into 20sec at 85%) with 30-60min between sets

Every cyclist knows 40/20s, but few do them like UAE Team Emirates. Instead of explosive intervals, the UAE Team riders typically do 40/20s at a hard recovery pace. The 20-second intervals are quite hard, usually around Tempo or Sweetspot pace as opposed to complete recovery. You can see this in Pavel Sivakov’s workout, in the way that his speed doesn’t vary drastically during 8min of 40/20s.

If you want to try this workout at home, aim for high Zone 3 during the 20sec intervals, and VO2 Max power during the 40sec intervals. While the pros have time for 30-60min of Zone 2 between each set, you can just take 5-8min of recovery in between each set of 40/20s.

3. 3x10min Steady Torque: 3x10min Tempo at 50 rpm at 90-95% FTP with 5min recovery

UAE Team Emirates loves torque training, and you should too. In addition to Pogačar’s explosive torque session, the team also has their riders do blocks of steady torque intervals. That means 5-10min blocks at 50 rpm, at a power output just under FTP. Well-trained riders can perform these intervals at 95% FTP, while less experienced riders can aim for more of a Sweetspot pace around 90% FTP. This session includes shorter recoveries of just five minutes between each set.

Tadej Pogačar has said that comparisons between himself and Eddy Merckx, the Belgian considered to be the greatest cyclist of all time, are “complete nonsense”.

The Slovenian is a two-time world champion and four-time Tour de France winner. This season, he has the chance to join two exclusive clubs alongside Merckx by winning a fifth Tour and completing the set of all five Monuments; Pogačar is targeting victories at Milan-San Remo and Paris-Roubaix to add to his previous at the Tour of Flanders, Liège-Bastogne-Liège and Il Lombardia.

“There is so much talk about me and comparing to Eddy [Merckx] etc. For me, it’s complete nonsense,” Pogačar told Cycling Weekly on Wednesday, as he announced his role as global ambassador for crypto exchange KuCoin.

“I like to live in the moment, in the present, not thinking too much about the records or whatever. I want to keep having fun, that’s the most important [thing] in cycling, in sport, in life, too; that what you do is for fun, that you have some sort of challenges, that you have some goals, but that you don’t overdo it also and overthink it.”

After Pogačar’s victory at the 2024 UCI World Championships in Switzerland, where he won with a 100km attack, Merckx told French publication L’Équipe that it was “obvious [Pogačar] is now above me – deep down, I already thought as much when I saw what he did on the last Tour de France, but tonight there’s no more doubt about it.”

Merckx later backtracked on his comments, telling Spanish outlet Relevo that the Slovenian had “a long way to go” to be considered greater than him.

In 2024, Pogačar completed the Triple Crown of cycling, winning the Giro d’Italia, Tour de France and World Championships in the same year, a feat Merckx achieved in 1974. The Belgian, now 80 years old, retired in 1978 with more than 500 wins.

Pogačar has been the UCI’s number-one ranked male cyclist for the past five years, and reached a milestone 100 career wins at the Tour de France last summer, aged 26.

Asked about his legacy, the Slovenian told Cycling Weekly he hopes to be celebrated for more than his victories.

“Maybe the results are not everything that I want people [to remember me for], just saying ‘Yeah, this guy won this and this, and won everything’,” he said.

“Maybe I also want to show the young generations that everything is possible. When you do this, you also need to play it as a game. It’s not all about cycling, you also need to enjoy your life.”

Pogačar is scheduled to begin his 2025 season at Strade Bianche on 7 March.

A more extensive, feature-length interview with the world champion will be published in Cycling Weekly magazine this spring.

Gather round and gaze into our crystal ball – that's right, we've gone a bit Nostradamus for the New Year and tried to work out what's coming down the tracks this year.

I think you'd be a bit disappointed to open your fortune cookie and get 'bikes might be more affordable', but hey, that's what you're getting in our restaurant. Just know that we will not be held liable should these predictions not pay off...

This is the final piece in a series of pieces where we have compiled thoughts from across the CW staff about 2025, after our riders of the year, moments of the year, our alternative riders of the year, our bike rides of the year, our races of the year, and our favourite places to ride full stop. Please let us know your thoughts!

Pogačar will win Roubaix – Tom Davidson, senior news and features writer

Standing on the artificial grass in the middle of the Roubaix Velodrome this April, there was a feeling that cycling fans had been starved of an all-time finale. Inside 40km, Tadej Pogačar had misjudged a corner on a cobbled sector, and toppled into the dirt at the side of the road. The time it took him to change his bike and remount cost him his shot at a showdown with Mathieu van der Poel, the eventual winner. Who knows what might have happened?

As those of us who watch a lot of bike racing know, Pogačar is a rider who rarely makes mistakes; only his crashes at Roubaix and Strade Bianche this year spring to mind, and he still won the latter. I can’t see him slipping up next spring.

Roubaix is a race he’s so determined to win that he’s spent his off-season in northern France testing the cobbles. How do I think he’ll do it? The same way he always does – riding away from everyone from range. The last Tour champion to win Roubaix was Bernard Hinault in 1981 (Pauline Ferrand-Prévot had not won the Tour when she won Roubaix). Forty five years on, I think that statistic will be reset.

Demi Vollering will win the Tour and return to her unstoppable best – Adam Becket, news editor

Demi Vollering finished top of the Women's WorldTour rankings at the end of 2025, which feels a bit odd, even though the Dutchwoman was clearly the most consistent rider over the season. The second-place at the Tour de France Femmes avec Zwift for a second year in a row dampened the whole year, even though it shouldn't have.

Vollering had a great 2025 at her new team, FDJ-SUEZ, and I back her and them to deliver even more in 2026. This is the rider who won the Ardennes triple in 2023, and surely has a Tour of Flanders in her, and the Giro d'Italia Women route suits her too. I think there could be a special Vuelta Femenina, Giro and Tour triple up her sleeve...

Phat tyres – Hannah Bussey, tech writer

Tyre sizes on gravel bikes have become a hot topic in the tech team of late. We've been watching the cycling community, in general, becoming more curious about all-terrain Frankenstein bikes that incorporate dropped bars, front suspension, and dropper posts, and wonder if there really is any space for them in an already pretty crowded bike market.

Adding 50mm tyre options (for the bikes that can take them) to the mix has challenged the naysayers even more, with many "just get a hardtail mountain bike" retorts. But given that every bicycle innovation received a similar 'what's the point?' response, it could be a sign that this is one trend that sticks in 2026.

Bold colours – Aaron Borrill, tech writer

Bolder colourways. There was a time when inconspicuous, stealthy paint was de rigueur, but my prediction for 2026 is the rise of bolder colours and brazen graphics. While we’ve seen a few brands trial this in 2025, I foresee more bikes outfitted in wilder graphics and colours come the new year.

More gravel and more bikepacking – James Shrubsall, senior news and features writer

With British Cycling having taken over the British Gravel Championships for next year, I can see gravel racing and riding – and its cousin bikepacking racing – taking another step towards the mainstream. Bikepacking racing in particular is more accessible than many realise, and riders just need to have that demonstrated to them. Oh, and Tadej Pogačar to win a fifth Tour de France.

Tech changes – Andy Carr, tech editor

E-pumps will get less boxy. Tyres will get greener, and browner. Saddle set-back and stem length will be back on the performance handling agenda. And we will lament the loss of the steel spoke in performance cycling. Hell, I might even stop talking about it.

The return of affordable cycling, and someone beating Tadej - Matt Ischt-Barnard, ecomm and tech writer

All the ingredients are in place for more affordable cycling: alloy and steel frames are surging, more affordable groupsets from the likes of Microshift are on the rise, the cost-of-living crisis and tariffs are weighing in, and Chinese bicycle manufacturers are entering the mainstream. I dearly hope that affordable cycling is once again on the horizon.

Finally, just for fun, to counter James: 26 is the year someone figures out how to beat Tadej, I can’t say who, but someone.

As the final Classic of the season, Il Lombardia has often flown a little south of the radar, despite its Monument status and stunning setting in the foothills of the Italian Alps. This year, that changed – all eyes were on the race as fans contemplated a fifth consecutive victory from Tadej Pogačar. He did not disappoint. As if by action-replay, he tore away on yet another long-distance breakaway and took the win, matching the record of Fausto Coppi, five-time winner of the race between 1946 and 1954.

Not everybody was delighted. Amid the cheering Pogi fans, there were dissenting voices – voices that had begun to gain a critical mass over the previous few weeks. “It’s the same thing again and again,” one fan wrote on CW’s Facebook page. Another said the dominance was lessening their interest in the sport. For some, yet another barely contested Pogačar victory was too much to bear. The great entertainer was starting to become boring.

Of course, the 27-year-old is only doing what he is paid to do, or even what he was born to do, if you want to be romantic about it. There is no question that Pogačar tends to win in dramatic, fan-pleasing fashion. But the same story repeated time and again becomes tiresome, and it has started to feel like 'Pogačar fatigue' is setting in.

Questions have already been raised over how long the world champion can continue to tick off prestigious race wins with apparent ease. Many have speculated on when he might retire – even his mother said she would understand if he left the sport in the near future, having seen how tired he was after the Tour de France – when he admitted that he couldn’t wait “for it to be over”. He remains under contract with UAE Team Emirates-XRG until 2031.

Entertaining dominance

To assess the scale of Pogačar’s dominance, former pro and TNT cycling commentator Brian Smith suggests stepping back from his latest Il Lombardia victory and taking in the broader landscape. “There are 36 WorldTour events in the year, he's won eight of them,” Smith tells Cycling Weekly. “I covered a lot of these races, and I can totally understand that nobody likes dominance. Nobody likes what Team Sky did to the Tour de France in the overall – people weren't entertained. But [with Pogačar] I think they have been entertained.”

For Smith, Il Lombardia was the only race that was too predictable. "You could argue that all the other races have been pretty competitive," he says, pointing out that the Slovenian races "with flair" and "in an entertaining way". Pogačar remains a supremely popular rider, of course, and while his team is the strongest in the peloton, it doesn't seem to snuff out competition in the way that, say, Team Sky or US Postal Service did in their heyday.

Those teams would routinely suffocate their rivals on key Tour de France stages before unleashing their leader to seal the GC. It was brutally effective but drained the drama from what should have been the race’s most thrilling moments, leaving neutral fans disillusioned. Under UAE-Pogačar, the dynamic is different: the dominance is no less real, but it’s far more individual than systematised. Even if you can safely bet that the eventual winner of any given race will be a Slovenian with the initials “TP”, it usually comes after an exciting turn of events – even if it is a carbon-copy audacious long-range attack. Not so long ago, such attacks would have had us rapt.

Still, for fans – and certainly for his rivals – there is an appetite for closer-run battles, says Andy McGrath, author of the new biography Tadej Pogačar: Unstoppable. It’s how the Slovenian reacts to defeat that reveals his true greatness, reckons McGrath. “You need lows to have highs,” he says. “It wouldn’t be very interesting if he just won everything for the last five or six years. Probably, my favourite defeat was the Tour of Flanders in 2022, when he somehow finished fourth, and he was swearing at everyone else. You saw he had that edge – that’s easy to forget… That moment said more than a thousand words could. He’s an inveterate winner, that’s how you win these races, you have to be wired slightly differently.”

Cast your mind back to the late Sixties and early Seventies, the era of Eddy Merckx – now remembered as a “golden age”. At the time, though, the all-conquering Cannibal wasn’t universally adored; many complained that his dominance was “boring”. Only after his retirement did the perspective on his achievements shift and consensus form that he was the sport’s greatest legend.

As McGrath puts it: “[Pogacar] shouldn’t be taken for granted. Why is excellence boring? When Pogačar goes, probably in five years’ time, we won’t see someone like that for decades, probably ever. It’s tricky.” Yet McGrath also acknowledges the tension at the heart of Pogačar’s dominance. “On one hand, I would say enjoy this, and cherish this, and on the other hand, sport requires unpredictability and rivalry, and we’re not getting much of that when he is attacking from 50km to go in every race and winning quite comfortably.”

The rivals

While Pogačar’s dominance looks set to continue for years to come, a few rivals are capable of challenging him – particularly in the one-day races he covets. At Milan-San Remo and Paris-Roubaix, Mathieu van der Poel has already asserted his authority. The Dutchman, winner of both those Monuments in 2025, appears to be the rider who can disrupt Pogačar’s ambitions. On the capi of Italy and the pavé of northern France, recent results have shown Pogačar meeting his match.

Smith notes that Van der Poel dominates cyclo-cross in a manner reminiscent of Pogačar on the road. “It's a bit like watching Formula One,” he says. “You watch the start and after that there are gaps everywhere – there's really no excitement.” Yet Van der Poel thrives in the unpredictability of long, one-day Classics, and has demonstrated he can match Pogačar. There’s a strong chance he will keep these races compelling next spring by preventing Pogačar from having it all his own way.

“The fire burning within Pogacar is the fact that he hasn't won Milan-San Remo yet,” says Smith. “He hasn't won the Vuelta yet. I say yet, because I believe that he can. [After that] what else has he got to prove? What else is he going to do?”

Joining the 'Club Cinque'

What about Pogačar’s other targets? Another Tour de France win would see him join the celebrated 'Club Cinque' of five-time champions, while Liège-Bastogne-Liège and a third World Championships remain tantalising opportunities. Is there any hope for his rivals?

There is, but it may require ingenuity, says Smith, who believes opposing teams need to be more collaborative and inventive. He points to Lidl–Trek’s Quinn Simmons at Il Lombardia, whose attack from the gun left Pogačar's UAE team, by their own admission, “a little afraid".

“They're not infallible, you know,” Smith adds. “Some of the teams are just riding to help them, and they shouldn't. I know it's a difficult thing to organise between the teams, because there has to be a lot of trust and friendship.”

For Smith, teams often appear to be racing for podiums rather than victories when facing Pogačar, settling for the UCI points available for second and third. But there are riders who can beat him – Jonas Vingegaard, for instance, who’s proven it twice at the Tour de France. Smith also highlights Remco Evenepoel. “[Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe] have got a really strong team for next year, and the fact that Remco thinks that he can still beat [Pogačar] is a good thing,” he says.

“You have to believe that.” Whether Pogačar’s rivals can ultimately topple him or not, his status is indisputable. “He's the complete athlete at the moment,” Smith adds, “and what we are seeing, in my eyes, is the best cyclist ever.”

Almost 300 men and women won an elite bike race in 2025, and that's only counting road events. Of those, it won't be a particular surprise that Tadej Pogačar topped the men's charts with 20 victories, and Lorena Wiebes the women's, with 25. It was Demi Vollering, however, who topped the UCI Women's WorldTour rankings.

None of this particularly matters in this latest list of our riders of the year.

We have already had Cycling Weekly's riders of the year, it's true, but that set of awards is British-focused, and decided by committee. This is a chance for our staff writers to go international, and make sure their favourites get their time in the limelight. There are no rules to this, beyond it should make sense, and repeats are allowed – although only one person chose Tadej Pogačar...

This is the second in a series of pieces where we have compiled thoughts from across the CW staff about 2025, and our favourite places to ride. Do let us know your thoughts!

Lorena Wiebes – Tom Davidson, senior news and features writer

Let me start this nomination with a simple fact: no rider, male or female, has won more races than Lorena Wiebes in 2025. The SD Worx-Protime rider claimed 25 road victories this season (Tadej Pogačar managed 20) – her best tally to date – and that’s not to mention the gravel world title and two track world titles she won, too.

To put it simply, Wiebes won everywhere. First race day of the season at the UAE Tour? Tick. Inaugural women’s Milan-San Remo? Tick. A stage of the Tour de France Femmes avec Zwift? Tick, plus another for good luck. For many riders, the tough thing can be keeping that consistency all the way through to the end of the year. How many of her last nine races did Wiebes win in 2025? Eight. Case closed.

Pauline Ferrand-Prévot – Simon Richardson, magazine editor & Anne-Marije Rook, North American Editor

Simon:

Being by far the strongest rider in the peloton is a gift. Yes, that rider can rightly claim to be the best, but honestly, how impressive is it if you win everything at a canter because of the physical ability passed down through your parents' genes?

What’s truly impressive is targeting the biggest two races on the calendar and winning them. And that’s what Pauline Ferrand-Prévot did in 2025. She also did it on her comeback to the road after years focusing on mountain biking. Yes, yes, yes, she will have trained on the road a great deal, but her positioning and peloton prowess would have been more than a little rusty.

Add to that the fact she was a new member of an already established team and needed to get everyone on board with her plan, and you have an exceptional achievement that surpasses simple physical ability.

Anne-Marije:

I’m such a fan of her story arc. We often, and rightly, call Marianne Vos the G.O.A.T. of women’s cycling, but Pauline Ferrand-Prévot is right there alongside her.

The 33-year-old Française is a 15-time UCI Elite World Champion across road, cyclocross, gravel and multiple mountain bike disciplines. She’s also the reigning Olympic cross-country mountain bike champion. Few riders in the history of the sport can match that level of versatility, that sustained excellence or that trophy chest.

After conquering virtually everything there is to win off-road, Ferrand-Prévot signed a three-year deal with the Visma | Lease a Bike super team in 2024, with the stated goal of winning the Tour de France within two to three years. She didn’t need nearly that long. In her very first attempt, and after five years away from the road peloton, she went out and won the thing. And with dominance at that.

Her Tour victory was nothing short of sensational. As was her Paris-Roubaix win, proving her versatility.

Ben Healy - Aaron Borrill, tech writer

In a sport that often tends to get quite robotic in terms of how riders approach racing, Ben Healy has been nothing short of a pleasure to watch. An animator in its purest form, Ben attacks using his instincts, not his power meter, and it shows in the way he races with his heart on his sleeve.

He demonstrated this in spades at this year’s Tour de France, where he delivered a magnificent solo breakaway to win in Vire Normandie on stage six. He continued his fine run of form to finish third on stage 10 and snatch away the yellow jersey, becoming only the fourth Irish cyclist in history to don the coveted maillot jaune.

And then he did it all over again at the World Championships in Kigali, Rwanda, with a performance that earned him a bronze medal. Asked about what events are on his radar in the future at a team event in Girona last month, the Irishman told Cycling Weekly, “I’d like to try the Cape Epic, that looks like proper fun.”

Mathieu van der Poel – Adam Becket, news editor

There's something about Mathieu van der Poel that doesn't always sit right with me, it might be the Lamborghinis and the self-importance, but he is undeniably one of the best bike riders in the world, possibly ever. If it weren't for Pogačar, his season with victories at Milan-San Remo, Paris-Roubaix and the Tour de France would be heralded.

It's hard to see how a rider like the Alpecin-Deceuninck man can be beaten at times; he can match Pogačar on the Poggio and then out-sprint him, too. His stage win in Boulougne-sur-Mer at the Tour was classic Van der Poel, and then he fought back into the yellow jersey again. When a race is him vs his Slovenian rival, you know it's a must watch.

Isaac del Toro - Jamie Williams, video manager

It’s close between Isaac del Toro and Oscar Onley. I’ve chosen the former because I think he’ll be the rider that takes over the baton from Pogacar as the world’s best GC rider. Del Toro made mistakes, mistakes his team probably should have helped him avoid, but he’s young and I think he’s learnt from them.

He also handled the loss of the Giro d'Italia admirably, how easy it would have been to cross the line and lose temper with the team, Carapaz or other riders in the heat of the moment. Stunning rides this year and his story is only just beginning.

Evie Richards - Hannah Bussey, tech writer

This one is easy: Evie Richards. She's the first-ever British rider to win the XCO World Championships, the first-ever to win the short track Worlds, and now, the most successful female rider in short track World Cup history, and she seems to have had an absolute blast while doing so.

She's one of the best role models for young girls entering the sport, being vocal about her firm belief that you can win on the bike without sacrificing your health and well-being.

She's clearly worked hard to strike a good balance between life and racing. You can see she genuinely loves it, and it comes through in her riding style. It's such infectious joy that you can't help but be delighted with every result she gets.

If, like me, you have a cycling-fledgling in the family, you would do well also to join the Evie Richards fan club; you'll become a happier person if you do.

Tadej Pogačar - James Shrubsall, senior news and features writer

It's obvious – perhaps a little too obvious in fact. But tasked with picking a rider of the year it's difficult to go with anyone other than Tadej Pogačar. There is little need for me to list his victories here – countless words and many, many stories have been written about them. We've even seen the first tentative strains of what might be termed 'Pogačar Fatigue' from fans (and by his own admission, he's been pretty tired himself).

But as suspense has begun to dwindle when Pogačar is around, the feeling has been growing in inverse proportion that we are seeing history being made in front of our eyes.

If you're feeling a bit jaded with it all (many aren't), know this: in 20 years' time your young clubmates will have to watch you become all wistful as you recount the Slovenian's endeavours. Enjoy this moment.

Wout van Aert - Matt Ischt-Barnard, ecomm and tech writer

Wout van Aert's incredible return to form after arguably an up-and-down 2024 season, in which any brilliance was overshadowed by injury, was fantastic to watch.

Top five finishes across the Classics season quietened any speculation about his ability to still race at the top, before he won stage nine of the Giro d'Italia to put it completely to bed.

However, it was that final ascent and, ultimately, descent of Montmartre climb on stage 21 of the Tour de France that showed just what class he still is, and I hope an omen for the year ahead. A race with Van Aert at the front is never a boring one.

Wout is back, and I hope dearly that he can add another monument to his 2020 San Remo in 2026.

Zoe Bäckstedt - Meg Elliot, news and features writer

This might be cheating because Zoe Bäckstedt is also one of Cycling Weekly’s riders of the year, but I got the chance to interview her for our mag - and our chat only affirmed her place in the top spot, for me.

This year’s success followed an already glittering career, as she added a ninth rainbow jersey to her growing collection. At January's UCI Cyclo-cross World Championships, she collected rainbow jerseys in the mixed team relay and the under-23 race. She then went on to win five of the six time trials she competed in, scooping up a national and under-23 world title.

But in her final race of the season, Bäckstedt won gold at the UCI World Championships in Rwanda as the fastest under-23 woman in the time trial. Yet, the attribute that most sung out during our interview was her genuine love of bikes - whether she’s cycling off road or on, she’s just happy to be there, riding at her best.

Tadej Pogačar returned to break his own Strava KOM on the famous Coll de Rates climb in Spain, setting a time of 11:57.

The UAE Team Emirates-XRG rider claimed the record last December, in a time of 12:21, but has now taken a further 24 seconds off the record ascent, on a Friday spin. The official verified Strava segment is 6.43km at 5.5%, meaning 347m of elevation gain.

Pogačar was in the area for his team's training camp, with Calpe or Benidorm on the Costa Blanca a popular spot for squads this time of year. The Coll de Rates is a regular haunt for pro riders testing themselves.

The world champion set the record time, which meant he averaged 32.3km/h, as part of a 226km ride he titled "Merry Christmas and happy new year". Last year, he set the record on 20 December, this year it was 19 December; it seems like a final flourish before heading home to enjoy the end of 2025.

The whole ride, which took over six hours, was ridden at 36.8km/h, despite taking in over 4,000m of elevation gain. That's some festive ride.

Before Pogačar, the record was held by Jonas Vingegaard’s former ColoQuick team through Peter Øxenberg Hansen, who set a record of 12:38.

Pogačar rode with teammates including Kevin Vermaerke, Florian Vermeersch, Domen Novak, Nils Politt and Pavel Sivakov.

The climb itself was seemingly ridden as a team time trial, in order to give the 27-year-old the best chance of succeeding in his goal.

Pogačar will begin his 2026 season at Strade Bianche in March, before lining up for Milan-San Remo, the Tour of Flanders, Paris-Roubaix and Liège-Bastogne-Liège.

His season will build to targeting a record-equalling fifth Tour de France in July, but it feels clear that his focus is on Roubaix and San Remo first, the two Monuments he is yet to win.

At his team's media day earlier in December, Pogačar said: "I think if I could choose one [race to win between one extra Tour title or Roubaix] it’d be Roubaix. I’ve already won four [Tours], so if I win four of five… there is a bigger difference between zero and one than four and five."

The Slovenian has already been spotted training for Roubaix, months away from the cobbled race.

The BBC is in the news a lot this week, what with Donald Trump suing it for $10 billion over defamation claims, so it is the perfect time to stick the boot in once more.

This Thursday, the winner of 2025's BBC Sports Personality of the Year (SPOTY) will be announced. For the uninitiated, which is probably everyone not in the UK, the award is given to the best British sportsperson of the year, after a public vote on a shortlist; it has run every year since 1954. The "Personality" bit of the title is a bit of a misnomer; it doesn't require the winner to be a great raconteur, just to be popular with the public. Five cyclists have won the award: Tom Simpson (1965), Chris Hoy (2008), Mark Cavendish (2011), Bradley Wiggins (2012) and Geraint Thomas (2018).

Since 1960, there has been a separate award, currently called 'World Sports Star of the Year', decided on the same night, also by a popular vote. Only two cyclists have ever won it: Jacques Anquetil (1963) and Lance Armstrong (2003), although the latter's was later stripped, after his doping came to light.

The shortlist for this year's World Sports Star of the Year was published last week, and, to my mind, came with a glaring omission. The lucky six are: footballer Mariona Caldentey, boxer Terence Crawford, pole vaulter Armand Duplantis, runner Sydney McLaughlin-Levrone, baseball player Shohei Ohtani and footballer Mohamed Salah.

Tadej Pogačar is missing from that list. The Slovenian, who has won 45 times in the last two seasons, 20 times in just 50 race days in 2025, has never been nominated for the title, in fact. It's hard not to jump to superlatives when describing the 27-year-old, but Pogačar has forced people watching cycling to reframe how good someone can be; he is arguably the best male cyclist of all time, and his snubbing by the BBC SPOTY panel stands out.

"I actually think he should be more famous in mainstream sport," his biographer, Andy McGrath, told me last month. "He's never been on the short list for the BBC World Sports Star of the Year. He probably won't be this year, which would be a travesty, if he isn't. He should be up there with Carlos Alcaraz, and Max Verstappen, the big stars. He is kind of too big for cycling. I wonder if that’s a pro cycling problem, like is the sport still seen as too niche? Or is it still tainted by Lance Armstrong?"

It feels like a bit of a mug's game to moan about the nominations for an award that I have no control over, so I won't do more of it – it just seems weird that in cycling some are bored by Pogačar's dominance, and yet he does not have cut-through outside of our sport.

It can't be that cycling is completely too niche; after all, there have been four cycling overall winners in the last 18 years. However, perhaps it's just British riders that are known by the wider public here, especially if they have done well at an Olympics, other global awards have been bestowed upon Pogačar, after all. He might be doing things like no rider has before, but there is just little name recognition – he shouldn't take it too personally, either, considering Eddy Merckx never won the award, or Marianne Vos, or any other dominant cyclist other than Anquetil and Armstrong.

Perhaps there’s a positive to take here: it shows the potential that cycling has to market Pogačar, to grow its audience, to point out to the world that one of the greatest athletes ever is currently riding his bike, and this level won't go on forever. Duplantis won last year, and could well win two in a row, as he vaults to ever new heights; it's not quite the same as solo attack after solo attack to victory, as Pogačar does, though.

He's my world sports star of the year, anyway. There’s something special about the world champion, who doesn’t just confine himself to Grand Tours and monotonously grinding down the opposition. He’s always on the attack, from Paris-Roubaix to Il Lombardia, and we will miss him when he’s gone, even if it is easy to bemoan his control over cycling.

This piece is part of The Leadout, the offering of newsletters from Cycling Weekly and Cyclingnews. To get this in your inbox, subscribe here.

If you want to get in touch with Adam, email adam.becket@futurenet.com.

This has been the week of the jersey reveal - NSN unveiled a patchwork blue and orange jersey, and SD Worx-Protime released what our news editor, Adam Becket, has already hailed the 'kit of the year'. I'm not so convinced.

In a week where fashion met pro cycling, other activities were underfoot, too - Tadej Pogačar unleashed his skills on the paddle court as Jonas Ambrahamsen showed us how well his off-season is going.

Perhaps, perhaps, people are running out of serious steam heading up to Christmas, so there's a lot of nonsense.

1. This video of nine Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe riders towing this glider to take off has to be the reel of the week. Why they did the stunt, who knows - it’s Red Bull after all, but the online chatter around it has been loud.

2. Actually, maybe this video is the reel of the week. A late contender sent in by Anne-Marije Rook, this dad towing both his son - and their Christmas tree - by bike is a feat worth celebrating: ‘Tennessee Dad saves Christmas!’

3. On the festive theme, team Visma-Lease a Bike took a break from training to don their honeycomb Christmas jumpers and see who could blow out a line of candles - whilst saying Merry Christmas in their native tongue.

4. Mathieu van der Poel was back on the road with a gravity defying - the result of a skipping hub, one commentator has speculated.

5. After Tom Davidson’s feature on Olympic runner Georgia Hunter Bell’s training regime that combines running with cycling, she’s been out on the bike with fellow middle-distance athlete, Keely Hodgkinson: ‘Sign em’ up Maap.cc’ one commenter writes.

6. It’s new team kit time, and what’s a more perfect runway than the Col de Rates, in Spain’s Costa Blanca? UAE Team Emirates sport a simple white jersey, while just ahead the Lidl-Trek team set off in technicolour.

7. What’s the opposite of ASMR? This American cyclist tested how many skids it takes to destroy a tyre. I can’t say it’s a joy for the ears, but it is a satisfying watch. Points to whoever works out what tyres he’s running.

8. A new off-season activity has entered the chat. Tadej Pogačar and ex-pro Thor Hushovd battle it out on the paddle pitch. Who won remains a mystery.

9. How cold does it have to get before you switch out shorts for leggings?

10. From chilly legs to dodgy tan-lines. This is how Jonas Abrahamsen is is spending his off-season.