"Tadej Pogacar will retire as the best cyclist in history" - Tour de France champion has no doubts
CyclingSaturday, 31 May 2025 at 11:18
Tadej Pogacar's return to competition is getting closer and closer. After another epic spring campaign, the Slovenian has went silent for a while to prepare for his main objective of the season - the 2025 Tour de France. And where else to test the legs than at the Criterium du Dauphiné.
The Giro d'Italia is coming to an end, and the name of Pogacar is once again on everyone's lips. Oscar Pereiro's as well. The former cyclist and the first Tour de France (2006) champion of the "post-Armstrong" era (albeit after disqualification of Floyd Landis), spoke at the Senate Day about the UAE Team Emirates - XRG star.
The event is a tribute ceremony to the 90th anniversary of the Vuelta a España, a race that hopes to count on the participation of Tadej Pogacar himself later this summer. Speaking to media, Pereiro was clear about Pogacar's not-so-near future: when the Slovenian retires, he will already be better than Eddy Merckx!
"Tadej Pogacar will retire as the best cyclist in history. It's true that comparing different eras is complicated. But according to Edddy Merckx himself, what Pogacar does he has never seen before. Pogacar stands out above the rest, and as I said he will retire as the best of all time," said the Galician.
Tadej Pogacar continues to add to his historic track record
History awaits Tadej Pogacar
The next few months look set to be decisive in Pogacar's narrative as the best in history. The UAE leader is going to face, consecutively, the Tour de France, Vuelta a España (barring a surprise) and the cycling World Championships (to be held for the first time in history in Africa with a brutal mountain course through Rwanda) as defending champion.
His arch-rival, Jonas Vingegaard, is expected to rise up to Pogacar's challenge and ride all three races as well. If Tadej Pogacar manages to win all 3 races, he will have taken a giant step towards equaling the historical palmares of 'The Cannibal' Eddy Merckx.
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- Yeah, I guess.. Some guys are just so good, they win without thinking or planning. He didn't plan on winning TDF2020 on his debut either, or being the highest paid cyclist in the peloton at 22yo.. I think Tadej is just tired - tired of hearing pundits say races are more exciting when he's not around. He even sarcastically told a reporter, who queried if he is out to win again, that he treats the Dauphine as a validation race, and not to worry because he would retire as soon as his UAE contract expires.FredMan12-06-2025
- Don't you ever touch another man's bike, boyyyy!yuckly12-06-2025
- Maybe I'm wrong because I don't read anything about it but in my perception he had some symptoms of allergy: hyperventilation, throat itchy (It's impossible that he drank water because he was thirsty after few minutes to start, his throat would itch)
maria2024202412-06-2025 - No, no complots or sophisticated deceptions. Simply, things went bad for Tadej, while the others did very well (Remco) or well (Jonas). From the start, Tadej was breathing excessively (hyperventilating), strangely drinking water just minutes after starting out. I read that in a sector he couldn't control the bike properly... Maybe all of that, and maybe he's still not in shape. It happens.maria2024202412-06-2025
- Wasn’t it 10km? Always possible though he’s not much if a planner ;-)Mistermaumau12-06-2025
- We’ve seen the basis of this with other riders/teams (where less money was involved but UAE money is cheap) already, how can you exclude it? Happens in orher sports too.Mistermaumau12-06-2025
- Can you elaborate a bit on what difference you notice or feel or how it changes your perception of effort on various types of terrain/intensity? Any pain or stress relief for sensitive parts?Mistermaumau12-06-2025
- Hey, Mads is even contemplating altitude training. We oldies should know better, nothing like time to help a young mind mature ;-)Mistermaumau12-06-2025
- Does anyone think this result could have been "planned" by Tadej? I mean, yes he lost a lot of time but you didn't see him really push after exiting corners getting up from the bike, he even used his water bidon (on a 17km TT?) to take a sip... he started at a steady controlled pace and maintained that pace throughout the stage, no pushing at the end to limit time loss... Could this be some kind of bluff by Tadej? "Oh no, I didn't manage my effort, look guys I'm so vulnerable..." and then in the Tour de France crush them once more? We'll have to wait and see!Lobz7712-06-2025
- Good luck Robin. I'm glad you are on the mend. Life is wonderful. Keep focussed on that.Cyclingsbestfan12-06-2025
Merckx was lucky with timing. A bit like Federer before Nadal and Djokovic caught up. Tadej is racing at a time when all big teams scout talent very young and take development seriously. He is already the greatest.
Merckx had more or less exactly the same situation as Pog with very capable rivals in each of his « specialities » only difference is that Pog doesn’t do hour records or track (which he’d probably not be that successful at).
Cigar farmers.
Merckx has a crazy number of wins, but so many were meaningless crits. for quality wins, Tadej rivals or surpasses him at similar ages.
Merckx has a crazy number of wins, but so many were meaningless crits. for quality wins, Tadej rivals or surpasses him at similar ages.
If Pogi retires tomorrow he will already go down as “one of the greatest”. Another five years at his current level and we can likely call him greatest ever even though he won’t equal Merckx for sheer number of wins
This is probably the most accurate way of putting it, nobody knows what’s going to happen, am sure plenty of us are old enough to remember people saying Senna was going to be the greatest ever.
In modern cycling, it's debatable if Merckx would have even won more than a few grand tours, I think what we are seeing today with Tadej is very special. It's also cool that we have a guy like Jonas who is very close to Tadej in his abilities, so they can push each other, I'm awaiting yet another Tour with these guys, it's going to be great!
Everything is debatable but you cannot just transplant a Merckx into the modern era. Almost every keen amateur today beats the best sportsmen of 100-150 years ago in almost every sport so if you want to make a comparison first you have to define what Merckx riding today means to you, the same guy born 70 years ago in a younger version with only the rivals, tech, knowledge, help, money, etc. of back then or the Merckx that would be born in 2000 if he hadn’t existed back then, with all the advantages. improvements, material available since then. For me a more interesting question would be to know if ge’d have been more or less motivated with today’s earnings, i.e. did the fact he had to race a lot to earn hus bread make him much better or would he have been better if he could have picked and chosen more because money wasn’t an issue? This obviously assuming he’d be able to have his attitude of back then in today’s very different world.
I've gone into great detail in the past, not just about Merckx but about other great champions. We will never really know, all I can do from my perspective is look at data.