Mathieu van der Poel (Alpecin-Premier Tech) revealed that even 650 watts weren’t enough for him to hold onto the back wheel of Tadej Pogačar (UAE Team Emirates-XRG) when he made his final race-winning move on the Oude Kwaremont during the Tour of Flanders on Sunday.
The Dutch three-time winner once again played second fiddle to the superior World Champion, who became the eighth rider to claim a record third crown at De Ronde, and simply had to accept that Pogačar was stronger as he put on another exhibition over the cobbles of Flanders.
Such was Pogačar’s domination that Van der Poel even made a rare reference to his power numbers, expressing just how high a level the Slovenian is operating at, having claimed his 12th Monument crown.
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His team admitted that it was hard to call it a defeat given what Van der Poel had to face up against, with Pogačar’s team lighting up the action on the Molenberg with just over 100km to go, pulling only the 16 strongest riders out of the front of the main peloton.
After Pogačar blew the race apart fully on the second time up the Oude Kwaremont, he and Van der Poel emerged at the head of the race as a duo over the Paterberg, when impressive debutant Remco Evenepoel (Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe) was finally dropped.
From here, they cooperated partially, with Pogačar doing the lion’s share, before the final ascent of the Kwaremont finally did for the determined but ultimately not strong enough Van der Poel. By the time they reached Oudenaarde, the gap was 34 seconds.
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