Tadej Pogacar: “Cannibal” of cycling, brutal and bestial method… Why the Slovenian fascinates as much as he divides

Start from afar, or rather very far away, preferably alone, and go to the end. Tadej Pogacar has just brilliantly invented a new way of running, transforming online events into time trials. Like Merckx, we said until now, like “Pogi”, we can now move forward.

Like Antonin Panenka, Dick Fosbury, Paulsen Axel, Alois Lutz or Rabah Madjer, he will soon have the pleasure of seeing his name enter everyday language, associated with a particular technique. Perhaps not revolutionary, since the best used it in the prehistoric era of the little queen, but “forbidden” since then by all serious manuals and treatises.

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You have to be able to adopt this strong, crude, almost bestial method, but above all dare to try it. If the Slovenian puts it into practice so regularly, particularly in one-day races (Lombardy, Flanders, Liège, Strade, Mondial, etc.), where he excels as much as in stage series, it is perhaps because he always considers cycling as a game and accepts his rare defeats, even when he bears the responsibility.

It must be said that he has more often the opportunity to savor the triumphs than to mourn his lost illusions, and that he is treated like the king that he is within the UAE team (under contract until 2027 ).

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The new Cannibal

As always when a runner crushes the competition, he divides opinion. As with “Cannibal” in the 60s and 70s, it is already accused of removing all suspense, and therefore all interest, for the spectators. We are not of this opinion. In our eyes, his generosity, his desire, and his demonstrations sometimes weakened by too much optimism (in Zurich, he was never out of reach during his historic escape; at the Ronde, in 2023, Mathieu Van der Poel was returned to around fifteen seconds) give his “outputs” an undeniable brilliance.

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Revisiting his raids in 2024, four stages and the general in Catalonia, six stages and the general at the Giro and the Tour (!), it is surprising to note that he was content with the yellow jersey, without raising his arms, during his real international baptism: the Tour de l’Avenir 2018, where he beat Arensman and the late Gino Mäder by a minute and a half.

Soon a demon in Hell?

“Tamau Pogi”, his nickname in the country, was probably not yet ripe. We can also see that, during his junior years and in his early days with the Espoirs, he was more often placed than winning, which perhaps explains his appetite today!

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The inevitable rapprochement with Merckx makes it clear that the distant heir of the Brussels resident is on schedule. Late on Milan-San Remo (there, he will not be able to overtake the master), he allows himself to be ahead of the Tour of Lombardy, a lead that he could further increase on Saturday since he will be the sole favorite, candidate for a fourth consecutive victory, a series achieved by the only one… Fausto Coppi between 1946 and 1949!

His detractors are already arguing that he will have much more difficulty affording the “Queen”, Paris-Roubaix. Let them once again allow us to think the opposite. He tasted the cobbles on the Juniors version (30th in 2015, 13th in 2016) and during the 2022 Tour, between Lille and Wallers-Arenberg, he took (a little) time from all his opponents in the general. In Hell, we can imagine that he will not wait until the Crossroads of the Tree to leave…