ANALYSIS: Why Tadej Pogacar's 2024 season is the best in cycling history

What we have just witnessed this Sunday, September 29, 2024, has entered the most memorable pages of cycling history. Tadej Pogacar was proclaimed world champion for the first time in his career after winning the World Championships road race in Zurich with an attack 100 kilometres from the finish line. Yes, you read that right.

The Slovenian is not racing against his rivals, he is racing against history. Every time he gets on his bike, something is going to happen. And in Zurich, what has happened is that the UAE Team Emirates superstar has completed the best season by a cyclist of all time. And he still has Il Lombardia to race.

Why is it the best season ever? With this victory, Pogacar joins a select club of 3 riders (counting him) who have managed to win in the same year, the Giro d'Italia, the Tour de France and the World Championships, along with Eddy Merckx and Stephen Roche. But there is one thing in which Pogacar stands out from the other two. For that, you have to go back a few months, specifically to April 21, 2024.

On that day, Tadej Pogacar won Liège-Bastogne-Liège in a race where the UAE Team Emirates leader won with absurd ease. That day's victory is what differentiates the Slovenian's 2024 from those completed by Mercx and Roche, neither of whom were able to win any monument. In fact, only Annemiek Van Vleuten has matched it in all cycling.

So yes, Tadej Pogacar's 2024 season is the best ever completed by a cyclist in the entire history of this precious sport. What will he do at the Il Lombardia? If he wins that race as well, he would enter a totally different dimension to what he has seen so far. And best of all, it's very possible.