"He will have to produce what he hasn't produced before" - Former teammate of Remco Evenepoel on ambitions of matching Tadej Pogacar

Remco Evenepoel has moved to Red Bull - BORA - hansgrohe with the goal of improving and, potentially, win the Tour de France one day. Most likely, he will have to be better than Tadej Pogacar at some point in time for this to happen, something which former teammate Tim Declercq sees as hard but not impossible.

"Of course it's a bit difficult question. I would say if you just look at the data, then if you want to match the level of Tadej on the climbs, the W/Kg and stuff like this for X amount of duration, it's just simple. I would say that if Tadej stays on the same level, he has to step up a level," Declercq said in the Domestique Hotsteat podcast.

The simple matter of fact is that at this moment, Tadej Pogacar is the superior climber in the World Tour peloton and this can be applied to just about any type of climb or mountain stage. Dethroning him is a mission that no-one has yet been able to achieve since his increase in level that happened in 2024 - in the races that are well adjusted to his abilities.

Hence, seeing this happen in the foreseeable future is difficult, but it is bound to happen at some point in time. When this does happen it may be a different rider, however Evenepoel is one of the riders with the very best chances of being present.

The two had their absolute best form this fall and consecutively finished first and second at the World and European Championships road race; and Il Lombardia. Whilst Pogacar won all three races dominantly, Evenepoel also finished an isolated second place ahead of the rest of the field in all occasions.

At the 2024 Tour de France he finished over 8 minutes behind, however Evenepoel showed an incredibly high climbing level and consistency; and above all he has a weapon in his time trialing ability which does allow him to frequently beat the current World Champion in the discipline.

But there is still a gap to be closed, and Declercq argues that at the time being, Evenepoel simply has no option but to improve his level if he wants to contest these sorts of races with the leader of UAE Team Emirates - XRG.

"Which is, I'm not saying it's impossible, but he will have to produce what he hasn't produced before, I would say," the Belgian argues. "And I say this with the biggest respect for Remco, he's the most amazing rider, he did such incredible results, also being already third at the Tour, it's crazy level."

However Declercq, now 36 years old and retired, believes that this isn't something that can be excluded from happening. "If you want to beat him he needs to produce power that we haven't seen from him before but again I don't say this is impossible".

And if Evenepoel, as is hoped, manages to avoid injuries and illnesses throughout 2026 - and further - then it is quite plausible that his level will increase. It is something that he has struggled with for the past few years, as has been the case with Jonas Vingegaard.

"A lot of time he didn't have the best preparation and lot of crashes and not really not being able to build year by year by year where there is really something in it".