"He's so full of charisma and that joy he brings it makes it an absolute spectacle" - Tadej Pogacar's dominance far from boring according to Bob Roll
Cycling
Tadej Pogacar had a season from the heavens in 2024. Everything the Slovenian leader of UAE Team Emirates touched turned to gold. For some though, this suffocating dominance Pogacar held over the peloton made the racing boring. In experienced American expert Bob Roll's opinion though, this criticism is way off base.
"If it was anyone else in the pro peloton, it could have gotten a little monotonous," Roll, himself a a three-time Tour de France competitor in the 80s, analyses on the latest episode of NBC Sports Cycling's Beyond the Podium podcast. "But for me, he's so full of charisma and that joy he brings makes it, for everybody, an absolute spectacle."
Across the course of 2024, Pogacar claimed numerous notable and memorable victories including Strade Bianche, Liege-Bastogne-Liege, Il Lombardia, the Giro d'Italia, the Tour de France and the men's elite World Championship road race in Zurich. "It was a spectacular season that he had, but with anyone else, can you imagine the same amount of enthusiasm people generally have for what Tadej did this season?" Roll asks co-host and compatriot Christian Vande Velde.
"You're not wrong!" Vande Velde answers with a smile. "He IPogacar ed.) could easily have sat back and let the UAE Team Emirates train just go and steamroll every stage, making it just so boring, but he's attacking full gas and risking everything. Like on the descents! How fast does he rip those descents? The motorcycles can't even keep up with him."
"What he did four days into the Tour de France this year was just nuts," Vande Velde recalls, having had the unique perspective of being on the back of one of the camera bikes. "I was so glad that I was so far ahead of him that I didn't have to risk our lives staying ahead of him!"
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Watching Tadej Pogacar win bike races never gets old.@ChristianVDV | @bobkeroll pic.twitter.com/lo89idkj6y
— NBC Sports Cycling (@NBCSCycling) November 8, 2024
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- That’s the most stupid thing I’ve read for a long time, did you not go to school and learn even the most basic physics? Aero depends on one thing only, drag, drag depends speed and the relationship is squared and apart from maybe at zero or the speed of sound or due to side winds that relationship is valid at all speeds, it dies not “suddenly” start at a magic number. Very simply, the faster you go the more the effect becomes important. If you think 25km/h is needed to have noticeable effects you’re delusional, athletic WR are cancelled as soon as winds top 2m/s that’s 7.2km/h, why because the assistance is already too important at that speed and the times prove it. You don’t even consider wind which can significantly increase the effective speed for aerodynamics and you underestimate speed of climbs, 6% is ridden more at 30 than 25km/h, a speed at which early generation high rims were considered to have more advantages than disadvantages. And finally, as in normal races you can’t just switch bikes according to terrain, it’s pretty pointless to discuss climbs as a separate situation, the aero will have justified itself plenty during the rest of the ride.Mistermaumau21-12-2024
- If you look at how much TP progressed in that 1 1/2 years you can no longer say that’s nothing. If Remco improves as much he’s a challenger!Mistermaumau21-12-2024
- Froome wishing to ride the Vuelta...he won't even be selected for the team!frieders320-12-2024
- Keep telling yourself that Remco but you not only have Tadeg to beat but Jonas!frieders320-12-2024
- Seems farfetched - I agree. Mas has beaten him once. Giro d'Emillia I think - 2022mobk20-12-2024
- Barring injuries, by the time Pogacar's dominance fads there will be lots of new young talent. Pogacar is about 1 1/2 years older than Remco. That's nothing.Sweep20-12-2024
- I actually don’t find that too impressive. In my later forties I did similar figures for a 3.5% gradient as a total nobody with no wind assistance. Am sure there’s margin for improvement there, especially looking at all the names on that list.Mistermaumau20-12-2024
- Jonas', was 6 years agospock12320-12-2024
- The race where he overnight suddenly turned nuclear after being packfodder at best for several years. His Sky days after that Vuelta and Pogačar’s last season shall remain the darkest post Lance stuff cycling has witnessed. Good riddance Froome.
UltimateOpportunist20-12-2024 - Finishing the Vuelta seems to be a reasonably attainable goal. Getting on the team to do that will be the more difficult challenge.
santiagobenites20-12-2024