"If a race doesn't suit him at all, he'll want to win it even more" - UAE DS backs Tadej Pogacar to replicate Tour de France heroics in 2025

Having taken the Maillot Jaune at three of the last five editions of the Tour de France, Tadej Pogacar will understandably start the 2025 edition as one of the pre-race favourites. With the route and profiles of next year's summer spectacle now having been revealed though, there are some differing views on whether or not the course suits the Slovenian.

A relatively flat opening week awaits the competitors, with plenty of opportunities for the sprinters and the puncheurs in the peloton to take glory. Although Pogacar himself is not afraid to mix it up in these stages, the second and especially the third week are likely to be where the Maillot Jaune is decided. Given his supreme dominance in 2024, UAE Team Emirates have understandable confidence in their leader, regardless of the route and profiles.

"After a very special, exceptional, season for the whole team, it's not easy to reproduce that. But I'm not worried about Tadej," UAE Team Emirates' sports director Andrej Hauptman says of Pogacar at the 2025 Tour de France in conversation with L'Equipe. "I've known him since he was a junior and he's always been one of the best at motivating himself and finding new goals. He's special: even in a small, flat race, which doesn't suit him, he'll try to do something that no one expects. Sometimes we even have to tell him not to sprint! Maybe even if a race doesn't suit him at all, he'll want to win it even more."

The chances of Pogacar to replicate his 2024 heroics in 2025 have also been backed by one of the greatest names in the Tour de France's long and storied history. "He is a born competitor," the five time Tour de France winner Bernard Hinault tells L'Equipe, fully in admiration of the UAE Team Emirates leader. "He has been working hard for five years, I do not see how he could not get motivated again. And the terrain suits him well, doesn't it?"