"How different my relationship with cycling was..." - Tadej Pogacar returns to the climb where he almost took his first ever Tour de France win
CyclingThursday, 23 July 2026 at 15:00
Stage 18 of the Tour de France initiates the final block of mountain stages at this year's Tour de France. UAE Team Emirates - XRG enter it looking to manage the illness that has impacted Adam Yates; whilst Tadej Pogacar reminisced on the climb to Orcières-Merlette where he almost won for the first time at the Tour back in 2020.
"Today I want to enjoy the day and spend it worry-free with the team. We'll try to do things as best we can to be healthy tomorrow and the day after, which are more important days," Pogacar said at the start of stage 18.
The bad day of Adam Yates this Wednesday worried the yellow jersey, who risked losing a key domestique, but also having illness spread throughout the team. There was a sense of relief this morning. "I saw him feeling a little better, but when you're sick, it's always difficult to recover immediately. However, I think he can hold on."
The riders will make the way into the Alpine climbs once again, although it can be termed an appetizer ahead of the 'Alpe d'Huez weekend'. The final climb will be 7 kilometers long at just under 7% average gradient.
It was here that in 2020, in his debut at the Grand Boucle, Tadej Pogacar finished second behind Primoz Roglic, outsprinted at the line - at this point in time, he hadn't won yet at the Tour, whilst he starts today's stage with 25 stage wins.
"I rewatched the finale of that stage just yesterday and realized how different my relationship with cycling was," he recalled.
Can it be avenged, the same way the Le Lioran finale was? "Winning today? Well, it was a very different situation; it was the fourth stage and it was a kind of sprint among the general classification riders. I remember being very happy with that second place."
Tadej Pogacar at the 2026 Tour de France
Read also
Adam Yates' health improving once again
“Fortunately, Adam feels better today, his stomach problems have almost disappeared," team DS Mauro Gianetti said in words to Sporza this Thursday morning; reassuring the team's plans should go ahead despite the recent obstacles.
The team wasn't oblivious to the risks, and Adam Yates has spent the day largely isolated from his teammates so as to reduce the risks of a potential infection for a rider such as Pogacar or even Isaac del Toro.
“The healthy riders and the sick riders sit separately in the bus. The riders who are ill also eat in their rooms so they do not infect anyone else," the Belgian rider explained.
“He feels a little empty because he did not eat yesterday," Gianetti added on the Briton. "He knows that he will suffer today, but by Friday and Saturday he should be close to 90 per cent of his normal capacity.”
“It was good that we stayed with him yesterday. There are mountain stages on Friday and Saturday, and his role will be very important.”
Rúben SilvaEditor-in-Chief
A founding contributor to CyclingUpToDate since its launch in January 2022, Ruben Silva has played a central role in shaping the site’s editorial direction and long-term growth. Before joining the project, he built his experience through independent blogging at Echelons Hub and by producing race previews for Ciclismo Internacional, developing a strong analytical voice rooted in daily engagement with professional cycling.
Beyond editorial work, he has been closely involved in the expansion and coordination of CyclingUpToDate’s wider network, helping establish and support sister platforms across multiple languages. This includes ongoing collaboration with CiclismoAlDia (Spanish), CiclismoAtual (Portuguese), WielrennenUpToDate (Dutch), and RadsportAktuell (German), contributing to a shared editorial vision and consistent international coverage.
He also helps oversee editorial governance across the network, setting standards for accuracy and consistency and coordinating updates or corrections when needed.
Originally from the Porto metropolitan area in Portugal, he holds a bachelor’s degree in Geography. His path into cycling journalism was shaped not through formal media training, but through independent reporting, community engagement, and sustained on-the-ground involvement in the sport.
Over the course of his career, he has conducted approximately 100 interviews across road cycling and cyclocross, ranging from one-to-one conversations and online formats to press conferences and on-site pre- and post-race coverage. His interviews include leading riders, team managers, and prominent figures within cycling media: Tadej Pogacar, Jonas Vingegaard, Mathieu van der Poel, Primoz Roglic, Wout van Aert, Joao Almeida and Tom Pidcock; managers like Patrick Lefevere and Joxean Matxin; and YouTube personality Bryan Kennedy (BKXC)...
Within 18 months of launch, he helped grow CyclingUpToDate’s English-language platform into one of the most-read cycling news websites, built entirely from the ground up. As both a professional journalist and lifelong cycling enthusiast, his focus remains on delivering accurate, timely, and well-contextualized coverage.
claps 0visitors 0
Just in
Popular news
Latest comments
- You can't handle the truth, so don't even talk about it. Capish? PS: The French didn't have a good Bastille Day this year did they? They were defeated in football...and they will be defeated in TdF... LOL ...mus-musculuspeedypogigonzales23-07-2026
- First of all, sending only one person would never be credible. Any team would claim procedure wasn’t adhered to and call for invalidation. Also, a single person would be too susceptible to manipulation. That’s just for starters. Police, debt collectors, justice representatives and the like also never go about official duties solo. As for teams, well sorry, if you kniw only top X riders woukd get tested, that’s a blank check for the rest of the team to do exactly as they want at night so to make sure the team is not being used for the leader, at LEAST one other random rider needs to be tested simultaneously. Can people sometimes think things over a bit before treating everything like some theoretical playground game?Mistermaumau23-07-2026
- > Imagine how many tight-lipped competent and available personnel would be required to descend on 10 teams simultaneously? You would need 10 persons only. Taking blood sample is not rocket science and any nurse or doctor can do that. Also nobody is talking about taking samples from whole teams but only from TOP10 riders fighting for GC.averagecyclist23-07-2026
- Due to the high bar of the evidence needed for testing, i expect Jonas and Pogi to text positive otherwise ITA is just bullshittingabstractengineer23-07-2026
- Ahhh poor Pogiboy. Didn’t see you moaning too much when it was western fans doing that against a western rider, which, using your methodology and analysis must be more than enough proof for you that dumb fans are not biased towards any one rider or his nationality but just general dyckheads. If you don’t have the level to separate those from the general population you’re just showing how desperate you must be for things to fit into the narrative you’ve chosen as truth, am sure you can think of which personality that seems to resemble most.Mistermaumau23-07-2026
- Firstly, seems like you are confusing ITA and AFLD where a biais would be more believable, secondly as I already suggested, any French bias would have seen testing of DT and RE instead of JV and TP. Moving on to big brain Plugge, obviously not very versed in the art of secrecy that is a prerequisite for this type of operation. Am already surprised TP was tested a whole 3 hours after JV and pretty sure by then someone at UAE was already aware something was on, you can’t keep such an event (2am ) from not being mentioned by someone to another and then another. Imagine how many tight-lipped competent and available personnel would be required to descend on 10 teams simultaneously? Imagine nobody noticing any preparations (very discreet gathering of known/unknown (if unknown once, certainly not next time) faces in one place. Imagine teams not noticing or sharing almost simultaneous requests for rider locations. Imagine it’s that easy to reach riders’ rooms anywhere in the middle of the night without being noticed. Remember how Lance could still dupe controllers only seconds away from him, read about how they have to test urine in tennis now because players discovered how to make as if they were peeing their current output, watch films in the line of Gattaca, keep informed on medical, mafia and business developments and stop being naive. Why would cycling suddenly be the only clean sport and that just when money is finally becoming interesting, why would « manufacturers » avoid cycling for sales, scruples?Mistermaumau23-07-2026
- Yeah, half an hour of TT is hardly comparable to over a dozen hours of tough long climbing. That’s like tweaking an Ironman down to 10 minutes of swimming. GTs should be including more time when riders have to perform on their own.Mistermaumau23-07-2026
- That’s not a sentenceMistermaumau23-07-2026
- I had another debate elsewhere following on from MM’s complaint which got some interesting comments, unfortunately it got closed just as it started getting interesting. 2 things I’ll carry over that I couldn’t suggest and haven’t been mentioned anywhere I checked: Firstly, the PS biais, sorry but that’s just not credible. If anyone up there had wanted to influence things like Trump tried (and failed) at Fifa (incidentally, did he really stoop so low to try to convince Rodri is his or was that a case of mistaken identity?) they would have tested Remco and Del Toro instead. Somebody’s best shot at proving being woken at night leads to accidents was a statistical argument regarding an increase of traffic incidents the day after clocks go forward. So firstly, assuming nobody adapted by going to bed earlier and secondly denying anyone might be driving differently because at some point they realised they’re later than expected or didn’t stick to their usual routine perfectly. As for today’s title, probably best if DT and PS leave the testing of Remco to the ITA, ride your own races guys, stop focusing on others, and DT, if Carapaz tries anything, remember your Giro.Mistermaumau23-07-2026
- Something not quite right in this story. They knew who you were or you stopped to exchange numbers? Obviously now you have theirs do they are identifiable and the text proves they knew there was an incident so technically they rode away from an accident without due paperwork. Not hard to deal with this correctly before telling the whole world of a tiny incident no worse than any cyclist has experienced. Always a bit weird when people get a voice to recount what would interest nobody should it come from citizen X.Mistermaumau23-07-2026
Loading
Write a comment