Slovenian Tadej Pogacar won his first world champion title in Zurich this Sunday, September 29, after launching a solo raid 100 kilometers from the finish of the road race to achieve a feat unseen for 37 years.
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The Slovenian dynamited the race with a completely crazy offensive, becoming only the third rider in history – after Eddy Merckx in 1974 and Stephen Roche in 1987 – to win the Tour of Italy, the Tour de France and the Tour de France in the same year. World Championships.
He won alone, maintaining a 34-second lead over the Australian Ben O’Connor and 58 seconds over the Dutchman Mathieu van der Poel, who was the defending champion, after a spectacular raid and in suicidal appearance on a long (273 km) and very hilly route (4,470 m altitude difference).
Accelerating 100 km from the finish, a distance not recommended in all cycling manuals, to come back like an arrow on a group of breakaways where his compatriot Jan Tratnik was waiting for him, he put back a layer twenty kilometers further on with this once in his wheel the Frenchman Pavel Sivakov, his teammate for the year at UAE. Sivakov accompanied Pogacar for a lap, delighted with the opportunity, before breaking down on the slope of Bergstrasse. With 51 km to go, the Slovenian set off alone to gain up to a minute’s lead over his first pursuers and finally complete his incredible odyssey and sign one of the greatest feats in the history of cycling.
Evenepoel misses the double
Behind, Remco Evenepoel, who was in the running for a new time-line race double after that of the 2024 Paris Olympics but ultimately came 5th, as well as Mathieu van der Poel ended up reacting with a small group to get dangerously close in a suspenseful finale. But without managing to come back on the Slovenian who, without ever gaining a huge advantage, resisted until the end.
“ I had put enormous pressure on myself. I had made this title a big goal after a perfect season. It’s incredible », Reacted the Slovenian runner, third in Glasgow last year. This is his 23rd victory in 55 days of racing this year, a phenomenal ratio when you consider that this includes a large number of flat stages where he had no other ambition than to reach the finish line.
At only 26 years old, his list of achievements grows day by day. He now has four Grand Tours, including three times the Tour de France with 17 stages won along the way, six Monuments and a world title to his credit for a colossal total of 86 victories. Paris-Roubaix, Milan-Sanremo, the Tour of Spain and an Olympic title are the last major races missing from the list of those who aspire to become the greatest of all time. The UAE rider, who brings Slovenia its first world title, will wear the rainbow jersey of world champion until the next World Championships organized in September 2025 in Kigali, Rwanda.
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