Tadej Pogačar (Slovenia) added the European road title to his World Championships triumph at the 2025 UEC Road European Championships, converting a 75km solo attack into glory in Guilherand-Granges, despite Belgian coach Serge Pauwels warning that an attack that far out would “end badly”.
The day out in Drôme-Ardèche was yet another dominant triumph for the Slovenian a week on from his 66km solo breakaway effort in Rwanda.
There was no reply as he made his move after 127km of the race, with Remco Evenepoel (Belgium) left to lead the chase behind as a select chase group formed while Pogačar sped off up the road. Once again, though, nobody could stand in Pogačar’s way as he rampaged to another stunning notch on his palmarès.
In the end, Evenepoel rolled in at 31 seconds down to take another silver medal after his efforts in Rwanda. There would be some wait before Frenchman Paul Seixas came home to take the final podium spot and the bronze medal. The 19-year-old celebrated a major early career achievement as he raced to third place at 3:41 down on Pogačar.
Further back, Cristian Scaroni salvaged fourth place for Italy at 4:04 down, while Toms Skujins (Latvia) rounded out the top five at 4:16 down.
“I find myself in the front and I tried to keep a good gap around one minute. It was a comfortable gap. I don’t think it was super dominant. Remco was chasing me and I couldn’t give up until the finish line. I had to push really, really hard. I’m happy it’s over and another title,” Pogačar said after his victory.
“Obviously we knew that the race would be the hardest on the third climb. They started to attack on the second time and we started to lose some teammates. Domen [Novak] and Matevz [Govekar] were still going really strong to keep everything together.
“On the third lap I saw there was four or five Belgians and I was alone, so it was better to be on the attack than together with too many guys who can attack you, so I tried and I succeeded.”
How it unfolded
The 10th running of the UEC Road European Championships saw the peloton tackle a 202.5km course featuring 3,400 metres of elevation with major climbs along the route including Saint Romain de Lerps (7km at 7.2%),…
Click Here to Read the Full Original Article at CyclingNews RSS Feed…