Pogi is back. Here’s our lineup for the GP Quebec & Montreal @GPCQM 🍁🇨🇦: 🇪🇸 @Igorarrieta9 🇪🇸 @juann_ayuso 🇳🇿 @finnfisherblack 🇵🇱 @majkaformal 🇸🇮 @DomenNovak 🇸🇮 @TamauPogi 🇧🇪 @Tim_Wellens #UAETeamEmirates #WeAreUAE #GPCQM
"The day after the Tour de France I was completely destroyed" - No regrets for Tadej Pogacar after Paris Olympic snub
CyclingThursday, 12 September 2024 at 17:00
2024 has been the year of Tadej Pogacar. After a break from racing following his Tour de France triumph however, the UAE Team Emirates is a little unsure of his form heading back into the action at GP Quebec on the 13th of September.
"Quebec is quite an open race but in the past, the attacks didn’t work very well and a lot of times it comes to the sprint, but the sprint is super hard," previews Pogacar in his pre-race press conference, in quotes collected by Eurosport. "But here we have a strong team so let’s see. I think we can make a hard race and we’ll see how the legs are turning if I can attack or just wait for the sprint."
Whilst ordinarily, Pogacar would be the almost unquestioned favourite wherever he turns up to race, given his lengthy post-Tour de France layoff, the Slovenian isn't so certain he'll be at his very best this time around. “Normally, after a long period of training, the first race is not so good," the Slovenian admits honestly. "But I saw at the beginning of the year for Strade Bianche how the preparation was for that race and I think I can be pretty decent in Quebec, better than previous years after the long period of no racing but you never know."
One of the reasons it's been so long since Pogacar pinned on a race number, was that he opted against competing at the 2024 Paris Olympic Games, despite some outside pressures to compete. "I didn’t like a lot of people pushing me to go to the Olympics, calling me and saying that ‘I should be there, I could get an easy medal’,” he recalls. “Nothing is easy in cycling, especially the Olympic Games on this kind of parcours. I think I made the right decision because the day after the Tour de France I was completely destroyed."
"The legs were tired, but I think it was a hard season from Strade Bianche to the Tour de France," he concludes. “It was all the way full gas and I was in super good shape and after the Tour when I switched off, my body went kind of into shutdown mode and I was feeling quite bad the first two weeks."
claps 2visitors 3764
Just in
Popular news
Latest comments
- yeah, that’s a more fair assessment. “reaching mathieu’s level” doesn’t mean you’re planning to replicate his whole career. the former IS doable, potentially. it’s just the latter that likely is not.OCexile25-12-2024
- That’s not entirely true. Every person follows their own development path and peaks differently. Remco and Primoz had hardly started cycling before elite level. Jonas was pretty much under the radzr until he unexpectedly had to take over responsibility at JV. Some guys only get real good in their thirties others have peaked mid-twenties. You can’t tell in advance how and upto what level they will progress, obviously his career might not have MVDPs length but nothing says he could not end up doing a few seasons at his level.Mistermaumau25-12-2024
- well, del grosso is 21 right now. when mathieu was a year younger than that, he was already winning elite level world championships, not U23. i think del grosso will be a very good pro for years, but if he was really going to be the next van der poel someday, he’d already have to be at that level right NOW. van der poel was showing signs of true greatness when he was 15-16. THAT’S what generational talent looks like.OCexile25-12-2024
- Yeah.... gear 😅.mikolajjj24-12-2024
- It shouldn’t be about expectations in the first place should it? Besides, if you look at everyone’s calculations as a whole they don’t add up in the first place. There’ll be 2-3 riders with a 50% chance, a dozen with 10 or 20% and dozens more with a 5% so we’re expecting at least 2 if not 3 winners. Remind me again who won before her? Says it all about using data to decide on participation.Mistermaumau24-12-2024
- Ok, happy I’m not too interested in this team coz’ the account of what happened is really hard to follow.Mistermaumau24-12-2024
- The UCI is worse than USA CyclingVeganpotter24-12-2024
- It's not like they wanted her to not win😅 She had an outstanding Olympics. But there's a reason why she wasn't expected to win the road race and that's ok. Things like this happen and it's great...better than seeing expected winners win.Veganpotter24-12-2024
- Bruyneel ? The man with a lifetime ban from cycling...why do you keep giving him and his doper mate, Armstrong, a platform?DJ24-12-2024
- yeah, agree. on the subject of being a “complete rider,” i do think that’s getting more interesting. mathieu seems to have decided he wants to get much better at climbing the the high mountain passes. he appears to be looking for new challenges, which should be interesting to watch. in most cases you’d dismiss a goal like that at age 30, but it’s mvdp. he’s never going to climb with the real climbers, but if he can improve enough it could open up stage wins when the parcours isnt just purely toothy and punchy.OCexile24-12-2024