Before the UEC Road European Championships, Belgian national team coach Serge Pauwels had a message for Tadej Pogačar – if he tried to attack from far out, it could end badly.
Naturally, the road world champion defied expectations, attacking with a full 75 kilometres still to race, and no one from the Belgian team could match his acceleration on the seven-kilometre Côte de Saint Romain de Lerps.
The move disrupted the Belgians’ plans to bring the decisive moment to the much more manageable Côte de Val d’Enfer on the closing circuits.
Then, the Belgians pushed the pace in the chasing peloton on the Côte de Saint-Romain de Lerps, dropping Jonas Vingegaard (Denmark) from the group.
“With that move, we wanted to isolate Pogaçar, and we succeeded,” Tiesj Benoot explained to Sporza.
However, Pavel Sivakov (France) then attacked, drawing out Pogačar and Evenepoel, who then attacked on the descent, bridging to the remnants of the breakaway with his biggest rival and France’s Paul Seixas.
A reduced peloton caught the attackers, and Belgium had the numbers in the group, while Pogačar had no teammates, and the team felt they had done everything to keep from benefiting the World Champion.
However, when Pogačar attacked early in the final ascent of the Côte de Saint-Romain de Lerps with 75km to go, even Evenepoel could not respond.
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