"There has never been a rider like him" - Adam Blythe says Tadej Pogacar could win any race on the calendar
Cycling
In arguably the greatest performance of his storied career, Tadej Pogacar soloed for over 80km to an incredible Strade Bianche triumph. This leaves the question, is there anything the Slovenian can't do?
Reflecting post-race to Eurosport, ex-pro Adam Blythe expressed his belief that Pogacar could win any race on the calendar. "We might never have seen a rider like him – an explosive rider, a fast finisher, a climber, someone who can time trial amazingly, someone who can drop into the Tour of Flanders and win it on his debut," Blythe began.
"There is probably not a single rider in history that has got the capabilities that this man has got. It's bonkers," Blythe continues, lauding praise on to the UAE Team Emirates leader. "You go back to Eddy Merckx, these guys. I don't even think they were similar to Pogacar. He can do everything at the highest level – not well, the highest level."
With Pogacar attempting to make more history later this year as he targets a Giro d'Italia/Tour de France double, Blythe is in no doubt about his capabilities. "Throughout the history of cycling, I don't think you can compare him to anyone," he says. "There's not a rider who's been able to do what Pogacar can do to this level. He can win the Tour de France, he can win Flanders, he can win pretty much anything that he wants to win. There has never been a rider like him. He's just an absolute animal on the bike."
Whatever, he won’t achieve what Merckx did, assuming he stays at this level long (which is not sure given he reached this level so young), might do Blythe good to re-check what he’s up against.
In the Merckx era the quality of the fields was significantly worse. Tadej is a once in a lifetime rider.
Except that he’s come in an era with several lifetime riders ;-) Same as Messi/Ronaldo, too bad for both the other was around at the same time, although, don’t think Messi gives a hoot, only Ronaldo suffers from not being incontestably best but then, he also needs that to keep motivated I think.
Actually, not sure you’re right there, very difficult to compare different epochs with different situations but he had to battle Van Looy often in the beginning and without Merckx, de Vlaeminck would rightly be considered one of the GOATs too, the fact they had to share almost every trophy between them for years shows there was greater rivalry and competition then than now where riders are pretty good at avoiding each other for most of the year whereas back then these two were actively challenging each other. If Merckx had been allowed to participate at the Olympics that would be the nail in the argument coffin, I don’t think Pogaçar would get far on the track, nor in an hour record, but as I said, times have changed. But, thankfully times are very competitive again after the more boring 10 years before Covid where there were plenty capable of winning but racing (Tours) wasn’t exciting or fun to watch due to Strategy trumping rider initiatives.
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