Pablo Torres on meeting and training with new teammate Tadej Pogacar - "The rider who has inspired me the most to get here"

The new jewel of Spanish cycling and UAE Team Emirates, Pablo Torres, has talked about what he thinks of Tadej Pogacar. He is delighted in the Emirati team and makes it quite clear that he is loving his first week with the team in it's training camp in Benidorm.

"I knew more or less how the team worked because I had already seen them race last year and in some races I'd ridden with the WorldTour team and at last year's training camp I'd already seen them, so I wasn't surprised at all.," Torres said in an interview with Eurosport's Laura Meseguer. "Of course, I'm delighted with the way they treat you, everyone is very attentive to you and the atmosphere is great. I think we all get along very well with each other and in the end we enjoy it a lot".

About Pogacar, he considers it a privilege to be able to be racing in the same team and to coincide on a day-to-day basis with the man who has always been his idol: "Tadej is my idol since I started cycling he was already in the elite of cycling and he has been the rider who has inspired me the most to get here and continues to inspire me every day. It's an incredible thing to have him on the team. Meeting him at the hotel for me is something incredible. He's the best cyclist I've ever known and he will be because he's the ultimate inspiration."

Proof of his maturity and humility, Pablo Torres still can't believe he's racing alongside the World Champion in the best cycling team in the world: "He's a very nice guy, I like him a lot, but I still see him as an idol. I've only been with the team for a short time and I still haven't finished assimilating what it means to be here".

"Time goes by very quickly, you don't realize it and I'm still a normal kid doing what he likes. I am not aware of all the people who are behind me and support me. I still do it as if I were an idol and I think I will always see him as an idol".

The Spaniard only recently turned 19 years old but he is already set to make his World Tour debut next month at the Tour Down Under. A Grand Tour will not yet be in the cards this year, but Torres already delivered incredible climbing performances this year that lead to very high expectations.