Teams & Riders Tadej Pogačar discussion thread

[Rou]

IDK, I'm not convinced.
He sandbagged a bit too much: 28 from Vingo and 48.6 from Remco; plus finishing behind Jorgenson and barely ahead of Lipowitz.
Had it been 10 from Vingo and 29 from Remco, it would've made more sense.

This way he had to show his hand in stage 6, anyway.
Therefore, what would even be the point?
Something was weird about said ITT.
Who knows.

I'll be real. This week has been the biggest troll fest when it comes to Pogacar interviews and statements. I don't pay attention to what he says anymore but to what he does.
I can make a compilation of him sandbagging and trolling this week.
This is just one small example: After stage 6 he said that he expected people to be with him after his explosion and to try to roll him with attacks. LoL. Pog, mate, you are attacking them with a gazillion watts and you claim that you expect people with you? After the stage he also said he was in a hurry to watch Urska's race.
The guy doesn't give a damn anymore and I love it.

 

[BigCoward]

Pogacar's stage-races results since the Tour'2020:

1, 1, 1, 3, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 2, 1, 1, 2, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1

15 victories, 2 runner-ups, 1 third place (winning percentage: 83%)

I have to say: not bad for a classics specialist!

Doesn't his classics results look broadly similar?

 

[James M]

Knowing the gap. Then came the end of last year (WC+lom) and the numbers he displayed at MSR this year, which were absolutely ridiculous not even close to his 24 numbers which echoed throughout the classics with some few other unprecedented performances which clearly showcased how he continued to elovate.

I'm not the slightest bit surprised by how easy work he made of this.

 

[Fos]

IDK, I'm not convinced.
He sandbagged a bit too much: 28 from Vingo and 48.6 from Remco; plus finishing behind Jorgenson and barely ahead of Lipowitz.
Had it been 10 from Vingo and 29 from Remco, it would've made more sense.

Nah, ITT similar to the last Tour but shorter. +10 from Remco and -10 from Jonas, but with his current shape maybe better.

 

[hayneplane]

We can add Dauphiné to the list:

next year, Tour de Suisse?



As we know Pog doesn't care much about the one week stage races, but he said he'd like to win the 7 major ones at least once each.
The issue is that Basque and Romandie, calendar wise, are a pain in the... for someone like him who has big Monument and Classics ambitions.
Had Tadej been a Vingo, a Contador, a Froome, an Ivan Basso, and so forth, it would've been a different story.

What do?
[/QUOTE]

Certainly possible to do Itzulia/Ardennes/Romandie if you skip the cobbled monuments but if he has half an eye on getting the all time record for RVV wins then he won’t want to offer up a free pathway to MVDP whilst he is still in his prime.

 

[hayneplane]

I actually hope that in isola he doesn't focus too much on the TT. The best climber will win the tour, now he has an advantage but vingegaard will be better on climbs at the tour, pog has to focus on that

The way he is climbing he could afford to lose 4 minutes to Remco in ITT and not lose a moments sleep.

A minutes loss to Jonas might be significant all round psychologically but not physiologically based on the most recent evidence.

 

[Tanakka]

I'll be real. This week has been the biggest troll fest when it comes to Pogacar interviews and statements. I don't pay attention to what he says anymore but to what he does.
I can make a compilation of him sandbagging and trolling this week.
This is just one small example: After stage 6 he said that he expected people to be with him after his explosion and to try to roll him with attacks. LoL. Pog, mate, you are attacking them with a gazillion watts and you claim that you expect people with you? After the stage he also said he was in a hurry to watch Urska's race.
The guy doesn't give a damn anymore and I love it.

Hehehe:
bro, do you even lift push 8 Watt/Kg for 1 hour straight?

 

[James M]

I’ve never seen someone win so effortlessly (aside from stage 6 where he clearly pushed, it was a sunday ride for him not giving away anything, while dead bodies left and right). The gap is grotesque in reality.

Anyway, Dauphine: done. I doubt we’ll see him here again next year. He’s said he wants to tick off all the stage races, right? So, Tour de Suisse next? Tadej, say yes.

 

[Salvarani]

GOAT!

What a performance

 

[Peyroteo94]

I have been reading some folks on Internet and I saw a lot of them asking for a Tour like 2012 with a lot of TTs to give Remco a chance. But I just ask in what world they live? Remco is losing consistently 2 minutes in every mountain stage to Pogacar.

 

[ppanther92]

I have been reading some folks on Internet and I saw a lot of them asking for a Tour like 2012 with a lot of TTs to give Remco a chance. But I just ask in what world they live? Remco is losing consistently 2 minutes in every mountain stage to Pogacar.

Remco lost 1:01 over 49km ITT. Wouldn’t change anything.

 

[Tanakka]

For what it matters...
I personally think it's just an interesting criteria, among many other possible ones.
I definitely don't see it as if it were "the be-all and end-all".
Nonetheless, it's still pretty impressive that Tadej at 26 years and nine months is #9 according to the PCS all-time rankings.

With all the guys left ahead of him who competed 35 or more years ago... aside from Valverde who is a very special case given that somehow he managed to be competitive till he was 48 y.o,

Who is the best rider of alltime?

The ProCyclingStats alltime ranking is led by Eddy Merckx with 3858.7 points, before Sean Kelly (2172.3 points) and Francesco Moser (2127.8 points). Considering the enormous gap between Merckx and Kelly (1686.4) we can conclude that Merckx is the best rider of all time.

www.procyclingstats.com

Actually, I personally know that Valverde always lied about his age: in reality he was 57 when he won the WC in Innsbruck.
His last year competing in road races, when he won CG plus a stage at Gran Camino, did 2nd at Strade Bianche, 6° at Lombardia, and so on, Valverde was 64 years old.

 

[Peyroteo94]

For what it matters...
I personally think it's just an interesting criteria, among many other possible ones.
I definitely don't see it as if it were "the be-all and end-all".
Nonetheless, it's still pretty impressive that Tadej at 26 years and nine months is #9 according to the PCS all-time rankings.

With all the guys left ahead of him who competed 35 or more years ago... aside from Valverde who is a very special case given that somehow he managed to be competitive till he was 48 y.o,

Who is the best rider of alltime?

The ProCyclingStats alltime ranking is led by Eddy Merckx with 3858.7 points, before Sean Kelly (2172.3 points) and Francesco Moser (2127.8 points). Considering the enormous gap between Merckx and Kelly (1686.4) we can conclude that Merckx is the best rider of all time.

www.procyclingstats.com

Actually, I personally know that Valverde always lied about his age: in reality he was 57 when he won the WC in Innsbruck.
His last year competing in road races, when he won CG plus a stage at Gran Camino, did 2nd at Strade Bianche, 6° at Lombardia, and so on, Valverde was 64 years old.

PCS is not good. Last year he had the best season ever and there are more 10 seasons better than his last season according PCS.
Being 2nd in every important race is the best season ever to PCS.

 

[HashRouge]

He is still repeating that he needs to focus on his TT now. I am almost 100% sure that he was sandbagging in the TT and is still playing mind games with Visma.

I thought he was sandbagging at first, but after stages 6 and 7 I changed my mind. Why would you pretend to be worse than you are in the TT, only to show your hand in the mountains? I think he was either on an off day, had an issue with the set up or had a pacing issues.

 

[Peyroteo94]

I don't believe Pogacar was messing with Visma in the TT. He was genuinely upset with his TT setup. If there is a stave where he was sandbagging, it was yesterday.

 

[rafa92]

I don't believe Pogacar was messing with Visma in the TT. He was genuinely upset with his TT setup. If there is a stave where he was sandbagging, it was yesterday.

yes, he was not happy about the bike, unfortunately it's too late to change that setup, but in isola he has to focus on climbs, not tt, it doesn't matter if he looses 40-50 seconds in the TT, as long as he continues to improve his climbing level

 

[Peyroteo94]

yes, he was not happy about the bike, unfortunately it's too late to change that setup, but in isola he has to focus on climbs, not tt, it doesn't matter if he looses 40-50 seconds in the TT, as long as he continues to improve his climbing level

Sola knows what Pogacar needs. Pogacar with this climbing level will be unbeatable.

 

[jmdirt]

yes, he was not happy about the bike, unfortunately it's too late to change that setup, but in isola he has to focus on climbs, not tt, it doesn't matter if he looses 40-50 seconds in the TT, as long as he continues to improve his climbing level

Its not too late to change the setup though.

 

[rafa92]

Its not too late to change the setup though.

I mean if the tt bike is slower than competition today, I don't see how it can be as good as competition in 3 weeks, research on materials and components takes a lot of time. They'll have to work on that for next year

 

[rafa92]

Sola knows what Pogacar needs. Pogacar with this climbing level will be unbeatable.

I feel like the climbing level of his opponents was not super high in this race, except for vingegaard who was good. But they'll improve a lot, also vingegaard will improve

 

[Jan the Man]

The TT is only 30km - the other is a pure MTT - I would be surprised if he lost more than 30s to Jonas but who knows. I don't think he was sandbagging but losing 27s.in essentially the first 7km is a little inexplicable as it accounted most of his time loss.

 

[Peyroteo94]

Its not too late to change the setup though.

Its not too late but it will be a shot in the dark though

 

[Peyroteo94]

I feel like the climbing level of his opponents was not super high in this race, except for vingegaard who was good. But they'll improve a lot, also vingegaard will improve

They will not improve a lot. They will improve and still won't sniff Pogacar's climbing ability. The only time he went crazy, he put a full minute in a 20 minutes effort.

 

[fenns]

I’ve never seen someone win so effortlessly (aside from stage 6 where he clearly pushed, it was a sunday ride for him not giving away anything, while dead bodies left and right). The gap is grotesque in reality.

Anyway, Dauphine: done. I doubt we’ll see him here again next year. He’s said he wants to tick off all the stage races, right? So, Tour de Suisse next? Tadej, say yes.

I would think he might want to ride Giro/Tour again - especially if he wins Vuelta 2025

 

[Peyroteo94]

Bookies have Pogacar with a odd of 1.40-1.50 to win the TdF. In their opinion, only a crash can prevent him from winning the race.