DISCUSSION Men's World Championships Time Trial | Was Tadej Pogacar humilliated today?

The men’s time trial world championship took place in Kigali, Rwanda, featuring a tough and hilly route that experts claimed was tailor-made for a rider like Tadej Pogacar, with over 680 meters of elevation gain and four difficult climbs to tackle in just 40.6km.

The first riders to commence the time trial were, as usual, non-professional and from countries with little cycling tradition. Shemu Nsengiyumva was the first man to roll down the start ramp, for the delight of the Rwandan fans, who were cheering for the local hero.

The Rwandan set a more than decent time (55:41, which was a better time in the end than important riders such as Mauro Schmid), and it took a while until someone could beat him. Some of the riders coming right behind him, such as Jalal Edward or Dictor Mut, coming from South Sudan, did not even have a time trial bike, which made the effort even harder for them.

Gianni Vermeersch was the first professional rider to appear, and his final time of 54:49 comfortably put him in first. He didn’t have much time to enjoy, as Michael Leonard quickly improved his time, finishing with a time of 53:39. After him, Ivan van Wilder came flying and smashed the clock, setting a best time of 52:22.

The Belgian had performed extremely well, a proof of that was that the next specialists were not even close to his time. Thymen Arensman, Stefan Küng, Iván Romeo, Mattia Cattaneo or Bruno Armirail were all far from him, and he remained in the hot seat for a long time.

Isaac del Toro was coming very strong, smashing the best time at the first intermediate point, but he paid the prize in the second half of the time trial and fell short of beating Van Wilder.

Behind, the trio of main favourites were approaching fast. Jay Vine, Tadej Pogacar and Remco Evenepoel were expected to fight for the victory, and they were doing so until the Belgian, who was the last man to start, arrived at the first intermediate point…45 seconds faster than both Vine and Pogacar.

The gap grew to 1:17 to Vine and 1:42 to Pogacar at the second intermediate point, so the outcome was clear many kilometres before they finished. As Pogacar kept losing more and more time, attention turned to whether Remco would actually be able to overtake him, despite having started 2:30 later than the Slovenian.

The answer was yes, and it was a historic moment that will be remembered for many years. Evenepoel overtook the best rider in the world and won his third world championship time trial in a row. Jay Vine and Ilan van Wilder completed the podium, with Pogacar finishing in fourth.

Once the race finished, we asked some of our writers to share their thoughts and main takeaways about what happened today.

After the first time check, the phenomenon already led pre-race favorite Tadej Pogačar by 44 seconds. On a stretch flat as a billiard table—how is that even possible? From then on, it was a matter of time before the Belgian reeled in Pogačar’s convoy—which he did. On the cobbles, he surged past and never looked back.

Pogačar clearly lacked the legs today. Bronze remained possible if he could shadow Evenepoel, but it wasn’t quite enough. Ilan Van Wilder stayed a few seconds ahead—a teammate of Evenepoel. And Jay Vine? In the final part of the time trial he put a full minute into Van Wilder.

Three very happy riders stood on the podium. The takeaway: no one rides a faster time trial than Remco Evenepoel. He inflicted the biggest defeat of Pogačar’s career. And that result will have consequences for next week’s road race.

Today was a historic day for cycling, and I think we can argue it was humiliating for Tadej. Not simply because of losing to Remco Evenepoel obviously. After all, the Belgian has consistently proven throughout the last years that he is the best at time trials. But this year it was different, because the route seemed better suited for the characteristics of Pogacar.

It had four climbs and so many meters of elevation gain, way more than usual. So, on paper, that harmed Evenpoel’s chances while boosting Tadej’s opportunity to win one of the very few main races where he does not dominate.

However, the outcome was completely unpredictable. Evenepoel did not only win, but he SLAUGHTERED his rivals. It wasn’t even close from the beginning. While riders like Del Toro, Pogacar, Vine or Armirail were all very close to each other, Evenepoel had already built a 45-second lead over just 10km. That is an absurd display of dominance, and the gap just kept growing and growing.

Only Jay Vine managed to minimize losses, finishing 1:14 behind Remco, which is very remarkable. Pogacar could not stop the hemorrhage and was losing seconds every kilometre, until the unthinkable happened.

He was overtaken by his main rival, despite having started 2:30 EARLIER than him. Someone like Pogacar, who had announced he had carefully prepared the time trial and whose route perfectly suited him, was destroyed. It is true he was “unlucky” in the sense that he started immediately before Evenepoel, but still, being overtaken is just a huge humiliation for someone like him.

And torture didn’t end there. First he tried to follow Remco’s wheel in the final climb, which should be Tadej’s main strength, but he was unable to. And later, he crossed the line with a worse time than Jay Vine and also Ilan van Wilder, which meant he didn’t even have a medal. I don’t know if Pogacar losing to van Wilder was in your bingo card for today, for me definitely not, not even for van Wilder himself.