By achieving a double victory in the two biggest tours in one calendar year, something that has rarely been achieved in over 100 years of history, the exceptional talent, who was always in attack mode, entered the annals of cycling.
After the latest Tour coup, the top star from Klanec near Komenda, who is engaged to cyclist Urska Zigart, still has other big goals. He could achieve one of them in the next few weeks with Olympic gold. The world championship title and the Vuelta a Espana are also still missing from his already very long list of successes. However, Pogacar and his entourage have ruled out the possibility of him taking part in this year’s Tour of Spain to try and achieve the historic triple.
Six milestones
Pogacar dominated the Tour, as he did the Giro in May, with six stage wins. The third overall victory in the Tour de France after 2020 and 2021, celebrated in Nice not far from his adopted home of Monaco, will probably not be his last. If Pogacar stays at his current level and is spared from injuries from falls, he seems difficult to stop in the long term.
In the past three weeks, there was no way to stop him. Neither a corona infection he recovered from shortly before the Tour nor the competition led by defending champion Jonas Vingegaard could stop the Slovenian. Three months after his serious fall with broken bones and a lung injury, Vingegaard put up a surprisingly good fight, but in the decisive moments, Pogacar struck several times in the mountains in an irresistible manner.
Many critical questions
Like many of his predecessors (who were often later convicted of doping), such as Lance Armstrong or Marco Pantani, Pogacar also has to face many critical questions. He always tells doubters that everything is above board. The well-meaning believe that his exceptional talent, coupled with hard work and professional support, are the ingredients for success. Critics remain skeptical, not least because of the fabulous record times he set on several mountains during the Tour.
The bad reputation of his bosses in the racing team, which is sponsored with a lot of money from the United Arab Emirates, Mauro Gianetti and Maxtin Fernandez, does not help to build trust either. It is undisputed that Pogacar could rely not only on his own strength, but also on that of his teammates during the Tour. With several top-class helpers, the UAE Emirates team always had the race under control and perfectly prepared the attacks of their highly paid captain. The fact that two of them finished in the top six of the Tour despite the hard work they did for Pogacar speaks volumes.
Offensive driving style, friendly manner
His teammates, such as the Austrian Felix Großschartner, have only good things to say about the top star, who always seems to be in a good mood. With his aggressive riding style and his friendly nature, “Pogi” has certainly won many new fans in this tour. Not least the way in which he achieves his successes has brought him comparisons with Eddy Merckx, who is dubbed the “cannibal”.
Like the legendary Belgian in the 1960s and 1970s, Pogacar is not only a gifted climber and time trialist in tours, but is also successful on all terrains. In addition to his four Grand Tour victories, he has also won numerous one-week tours and several major one-day classics such as the Tour of Flanders (1 x), Liège-Bastogne-Liège (2 x) and the Tour of Lombardy (3 x). Accusing Pogacar of his hunger for victory seems unfair and strange, not only in light of the recent past with other dominators such as Vingegaard or the serial winners of Sky-Ineos around Chris Froome.
