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UAE had some hilarious training motivation for Tadej Pogačar

Tadej Pogačar on 2025 Paris-Roubaix

When you’re the best in the world, you still need the best motivation. Tadej Pogačar is getting ready for the 2025 season, where he hopes to blow the doors off his competition once more. Can he trump what he did in 2024? Is that even possible?

The Slovenian took an impressive 25 wins, with the most remarkable being the 2024 UCI road worlds. He made an extraordinary move, breaking away with 100 km to go, bridging to the leaders, and then soloing the final 50 km to victory.

Pogačar achieved the Triple Crown by winning the Giro d’Italia, the Tour de France, and the road worlds, becoming the first rider to do so since Stephen Roche in 1987. The only other male rider to have completed this feat is the legendary Eddy Merckx. Annemiek van Vleuten is the only female rider to have accomplished it.

Can Pogačar  ever top his 2024 season?

At the Giro, he was godly. Six stage wins, the pink jersey, the KOM jersey–fifth in the points competition. Dani Martínez (Red Bull – BORA – hansgrohe) was second in G.C. a whopping ten minutes behind.

At the Tour, he beat his arch-rival Jonas Vingegaard of Visma – Lease a Bike by six minutes. Like at the Tour of Italy, Pogi took six stage wins.

The competition between Vingegaard and Pogi was definitely lopsided. The Dane crashed early in the year at the Tour de Pays Basque and only announced he would race the Tour a week before it began. Like Pogačar the previous year, he entered the Tour without the advantage of the usual lead-up races. He entered the Tour with less-than-optimal form after a crash at Liège-Bastogne-Liège left him with a broken wrist, derailing his preparation. With only two post-crash races—the Slovenian national TT and road race championships—under his belt, he fought hard but ultimately cracked on Stage 17.

In-form Vingegaard vs. in-form Pogačar

As former pro Jose DeCauwer boldly claimed, “To be frank, Vingegaard should never have won a Tour, considering Pogačar’s absolutely superior talent.”

Hopefully in 2025, we will see both riders at their top form and be privy to an absolute battle royale between two of the best cyclists in the world. Might Remco Evenepoel, double Olympic champion, also be a contender? Certainly, his season is not off to a good start, after being doored while training in December. Initially planning to return in the Ardèche and Drôme Classic, he now aims to start at the Flèche Brabançonne in April, followed by the Ardennes Classics, with a goal to…

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