“He wanted only me to touch his bike” – Inside the trust that underpins Tadej Pogacar’s dominance

For much of his first season at UAE Team Emirates, mechanic Bostjan Kavcnik was not allowed anywhere near Tadej Pogacar’s bike.

“That meant I had to prove myself, literally,” Kavcnik explains in conversation with Siol. “At the beginning I was not even allowed to touch Pogacar’s bike.”

Today, the relationship could hardly be more different. Pogacar now insists that Kavcnik alone works on his race bike, a level of trust that is rare even at WorldTour level and one that carries enormous responsibility.

“When Tadej had certain problems, he personally expressed the wish that from that day on he wanted to work exclusively with me,” Kavcnik said. “That only I would touch his bike.”

What followed was not just professional recognition, but a quiet restructuring of how Pogacar operates behind the scenes. It is a story not about marginal gains, but about certainty in a sport where uncertainty is everywhere.

For Kavcnik, the foundation of that relationship is simple. “The bike is the rider’s only contact point, his only weapon,” he said. “If it does not function flawlessly, everything is at risk, from results to health.”

It is why trust, once broken, cannot be rebuilt. “When trust between a mechanic and a rider is broken, cooperation is over,” Kavcnik said. “Some mechanics perhaps do not even deserve to work at WorldTour level.”

That philosophy now governs Pogacar’s entire logistics chain. While the rest of the UAE squad travels with their bikes to training camps, Pogacar does not. “He is the only one who comes to the camp and leaves without a bike,” Kavcnik said. “I personally deliver his new bike to him, and at the same time I bring him his old one.”

One bike is kept permanently in Slovenia, another follows Pogacar’s Monaco based training routine. It is a privilege that developed gradually rather than being demanded.

“We reached this level gradually,” Kavcnik said. “In the early years this was not the case and he always travelled with his bikes.”

The trust Pogacar places in one mechanic exists inside a much larger operation. At the UAE Team Emirates - XRG training camp, preparation is industrial in scale. “Riders arrive with the old bikes they trained on all year,” Kavcnik explained. “Here they receive new ones.”

What follows is weeks of meticulous comparison, adjustment and recording. “Mechanics and the staff responsible for bike fitting check every detail,” he said. “We make adjustments if needed, adapt saddles, positions on time trial bikes. This process runs practically throughout the entire camp.”

In the final days, every change is logged before riders leave with their new machines. “There are around 30 professional riders here, about 15 from the development team and a few juniors,” Kavcnik said. “All bikes are checked every day and often thoroughly cleaned.”

For the mechanics, the workload is relentless. “For the men’s team alone there are ten mechanics here,” he said. “Each mechanic is responsible for a specific number of riders.”

The Benidorm camp also serves another function. It exposes new riders and staff to the realities of top level cycling. “In these two weeks you quickly see who knows what, how people work and what their attitude towards work and the team is like,” Kavcnik said.

Away from racing, Kavcnik’s off season is spent assembling bikes, sometimes in overwhelming numbers. “The 2025 season was extremely demanding for us,” he said. “We had to build nearly 300 bikes.”

That workload was intensified by rapid equipment evolution. “We had three road bike models,” Kavcnik said. “We started with the V4Rs, continued with the V5Rs and then came the Y1Rs.”

For Pogacar, it meant more bike changes than at any point in his career. “In 2025, Pogacar rode more different bikes than ever before,” Kavcnik said. “Three base models, plus the yellow bike, the black one and the special world champion bike.”

Each change added pressure. “Every bike has to be prepared perfectly, down to the smallest detail,” he said. “Tadej expects that, and to be honest, he deserves nothing less.”

Race days move Kavcnik from workshop to convoy, where preparation meets chaos. “You always have to stay alert,” he said. “Sometimes a mechanic in the car even falls asleep because the pace and schedule are brutal.”

The days are long and unforgiving. “Sometimes I start at six in the morning and go to bed at midnight,” Kavcnik said. “The car is sometimes the only place where you can briefly close your eyes.”

Even then, the tension does not disappear. “You constantly wonder whether everything will be okay,” he said. “That tension is always present, but with experience it becomes a little easier.”

When incidents happen, protocol takes over. "You wait until the car stops and only then react,” Kavcnik said. “The better coordinated the driver, sports director and mechanic are, the faster and more precise the intervention.”

Amid Pogacar’s headline grabbing victories in 2025, one detail mattered deeply inside the team. “This season, for example, he did not have a single puncture that required a wheel change,” Kavcnik said.

It is a statistic he mentions cautiously. “I do not like saying that out loud,” he added. “But it is something we can be proud of.”

For Kavcnik, it reflects far more than luck. “It speaks of excellent tyres, top level equipment, and also of the rider’s skill and feel for the bike,” he said.

Riders, he notes, differ dramatically in how they treat their machines. “Some return from a recon ride with a bike that looks as if they deliberately searched for every puddle,” he said. “Others return with a spotless bike.”

Pogacar belongs firmly in the latter group.

Being chosen as Pogacar’s exclusive mechanic brought prestige, but also weight. “On one hand it was a huge recognition,” Kavcnik said. “On the other hand it was also a massive responsibility and quite a few sleepless nights.”

Today, that responsibility is built into UAE’s planning. “The coordinator automatically knows that for races where Pogacar is racing, I must also be sent,” he said. “Our calendars are practically aligned.”

Kavcnik often travels days ahead of Pogacar, preparing logistics, equipment and details long before the rider arrives. “Every detail must be in place,” he said.

In modern cycling, victory is often framed through data, training plans and tactics. Kavcnik’s story offers a quieter truth. At the heart of Pogacar’s dominance sits something simpler and far harder to manufacture. Trust.