Teams & Riders Tadej Pogačar discussion thread

[yaf2]

He's had an accident. If it had been another rider, they'd be reminiscing about the accident every day and the fact that he has a huge wound on his arm, which will make it difficult for him to sleep.

He also has congestion, which is why he breathes through his mouth so much in the later stages. When you have congestion, you have less energy. Breathing through your mouth is more tiring.

https://twitter.com/x/status/1947688429350961570

View: https://x.com/BikesNWatts/status/1947688429350961570?t=G1a1uVYWTzbw51Qt7WmvvQ&s=19

His watts are significantly lower than last year while jonas is almost at his last year level considering he suffered from jonas pace today. And i dont think an abrasion on the arm dips ur form this much. I remember 2021 when jonas had also multiple abrasions on stage 8 & was dropping pog on stage 11 of ventoux. The bike theory must be seriously considered as i saw him all year he didn't look comfortable on it to push his usual watts.
Jebel hafeet - average(not even close to yates record)
Cipressa - not top level watts
Tdf 1st week - couldn't drop jonas on his speciality climbs(short climbs)
Hautacam - not even close to 2024 level
# All his demonstrations the whole year from strade to flanders, from roubaix to fleiche, from liege to dauphine were all made on either V4rs or V5rs. Imo all the datas so far suggest that its legitimate to raise the question on the team that why are they sticking to y1 all race

 

[Bombarolo]

https://twitter.com/x/status/1947688429350961570

View: https://x.com/BikesNWatts/status/1947688429350961570?t=G1a1uVYWTzbw51Qt7WmvvQ&s=19

His watts are significantly lower than last year while jonas is almost at his last year level considering he suffered from jonas pace today. And i dont think an abrasion on the arm dips ur form this much. I remember 2021 when jonas had also multiple abrasions on stage 8 & was dropping pog on stage 11 of ventoux. The bike theory must be seriously considered as i saw him all year he didn't look comfortable on it to push his usual watts.
Jebel hafeet - average(not even close to yates record)
Cipressa - not top level watts
Tdf 1st week - couldn't drop jonas on his speciality climbs(short climbs)
Hautacam - not even close to 2024 level
# All his demonstrations the whole year from strade to flanders, from roubaix to fleiche, from liege to dauphine were all made on either V4rs or V5rs. Imo all the datas so far suggest that its legitimate to raise the question on the team that why are they sticking to y1 all race

Vingegaard still under PdB 2024.

 

[Rou]

https://twitter.com/x/status/1947688429350961570

View: https://x.com/BikesNWatts/status/1947688429350961570?t=G1a1uVYWTzbw51Qt7WmvvQ&s=19

His watts are significantly lower than last year while jonas is almost at his last year level considering he suffered from jonas pace today. And i dont think an abrasion on the arm dips ur form this much. I remember 2021 when jonas had also multiple abrasions on stage 8 & was dropping pog on stage 11 of ventoux. The bike theory must be seriously considered as i saw him all year he didn't look comfortable on it to push his usual watts.
Jebel hafeet - average(not even close to yates record)
Cipressa - not top level watts
Tdf 1st week - couldn't drop jonas on his speciality climbs(short climbs)
Hautacam - not even close to 2024 level
# All his demonstrations the whole year from strade to flanders, from roubaix to fleiche, from liege to dauphine were all made on either V4rs or V5rs. Imo all the datas so far suggest that its legitimate to raise the question on the team that why are they sticking to y1 all race

Is it possible they are so confident that Pogacar is superior to Jonas that they are forcing him to ride the aero bike?
Or we are making stuff up? LoL

 

[Valv.Piti]

Aside from today's stage, which I won't comment on, I was already convinced of this yesterday: there's no need to attack from afar when you have a four-minute lead and two or three stages of mountain terrain to go. Unless you feel extremely superior or have exceptional legs on that particular day. The only risk is digging into the red... and when you get there, the possibility of paying dearly for it in subsequent stages is real. If you're aiming for stages, now it's enough to win them with the least possible effort.(Which was possible today, for example 😂)

UAE just *** the bed. Politt didn't do his job, once that big group went and you were not prepared to drop Sivakov back or pace with Wellens, it was over. I think its a 50/50 on the DS and Politt

 

[Jack_89]

UAE just *** the bed. Politt didn't do his job, once that big group went and you were not prepared to drop Sivakov back or pace with Wellens, it was over. I think its a 50/50 on the DS and Politt

It's also possible that they're preserving the team. Loze is there on Thursday.

 

[yaf2]

Is it possible they are so confident that Pogacar is superior to Jonas that they are forcing him to ride the aero bike?
Or we are making stuff up? LoL

Idk men i might be over thinking it but the thing that annoys me is why are they experimenting it on the tour & why not test it on dauphine?

 

[Rou]

UAE just *** the bed. Politt didn't do his job, once that big group went and you were not prepared to drop Sivakov back or pace with Wellens, it was over. I think its a 50/50 on the DS and Politt

The LR guys are saying that Politt is nervous because he can't do his job properly.
I agree in some sense because I expected him to keep it under 5 mins today.
Instead he was closing random gaps at the beginning of the race.

 

[yaf2]

Vingegaard still under PdB 2024.

https://twitter.com/x/status/1947686604048372027

View: https://x.com/WattsinCycling/status/1947686604048372027?t=QffedgNoA1kso_xmBO-w7A&s=19

https://twitter.com/x/status/1947688226216435782

View: https://x.com/WattsinCycling/status/1947688226216435782?t=zkP89-9hQQWdKJMzXtHKKQ&s=19

They're saying he is at the same level as couillole

 

[Valv.Piti]

Should just go with their normal strategy of trying to keep out of the break phase and just put Politt and Sivakov on the front and keep it in check. It was obvious, Sivakov is trash this race anyways. Another unfortunate thing was getting Benoot and Campy in the break as well so 1) Jonas could bridge if the drops him or 2) if Pog felt he could drop Jonas before Chalet, Campy can pace in the headwind. And thats not even taking the stage win into account. Very bad tactics today on their part which today only cost 4 seconds and a stage but potentially also could cost more.

However, once the 3 riders got up front Politt should just ride a solid pace instead of closing people down and yelling at them. He antagonized them, so he got what he deserved today. Lots of different stuff to look and analyze for the team

 

[rafa92]

https://twitter.com/x/status/1947688429350961570

View: https://x.com/BikesNWatts/status/1947688429350961570?t=G1a1uVYWTzbw51Qt7WmvvQ&s=19

His watts are significantly lower than last year while jonas is almost at his last year level considering he suffered from jonas pace today. And i dont think an abrasion on the arm dips ur form this much. I remember 2021 when jonas had also multiple abrasions on stage 8 & was dropping pog on stage 11 of ventoux. The bike theory must be seriously considered as i saw him all year he didn't look comfortable on it to push his usual watts.
Jebel hafeet - average(not even close to yates record)
Cipressa - not top level watts
Tdf 1st week - couldn't drop jonas on his speciality climbs(short climbs)
Hautacam - not even close to 2024 level
# All his demonstrations the whole year from strade to flanders, from roubaix to fleiche, from liege to dauphine were all made on either V4rs or V5rs. Imo all the datas so far suggest that its legitimate to raise the question on the team that why are they sticking to y1 all race

totally agree with you on the aero bike, but when it comes to his watts he might also not be at his best (cold + abrasions maybe took out of him even just 2%). But visually he looks always very uncomfortable on that bike, especially when 1) gradients are higher than 7% and 2) he's going all out

 

[Peyroteo94]

I simply don't understand why he is racing the aerobike in mountain stages, specially when he raced with this bike only in UAE and in the Tour

 

[Rou]

The funniest thing today was watching Soler.
They passed him like a road sign and a minute later he started sprinting to catch back.
Marc, if you can catch them with such an attack you deserve to win the TDF!
Solerism effect at full force.

 

[topt]

Is it possible they are so confident that Pogacar is superior to Jonas that they are forcing him to ride the aero bike?
Or we are making stuff up? LoL

the aero bike is at 6.8kg

 

[Peyroteo94]

It's not Politt. It's Sivakov, Soler, Sivakov and Yates who are really underperforming

 

[Mayomaniac]

Should just go with their normal strategy of trying to keep out of the break phase and just put Politt and Sivakov on the front and keep it in check. It was obvious, Sivakov is trash this race anyways. Another unfortunate thing was getting Benoot and Campy in the break as well so 1) Jonas could bridge if the drops him or 2) if Pog felt he could drop Jonas before Chalet, Campy can pace in the headwind. And thats not even taking the stage win into account. Very bad tactics today on their part which today only cost 4 seconds and a stage but potentially also could cost more.

However, once the 3 riders got up front Politt should just ride a solid pace instead of closing people down and yelling at them. He antagonized them, so he got what he deserved today. Lots of different stuff to look and analyze for the team

I mean, Politt got a big head from riding for the top team captain and is now behaving like a proper pos.
And Soler racing like he's back at Movistar was actually fun to watch, Swiss TV commentators were almost shouting "No, what is he doing?! This makes no sense!"

 

[Rou]

the aero bike is at 6.8kg

I knew that somebody would mention the weight.
Another super important factor is the geometry of the bike and how comfortable Pogacar is riding it.
Pogacar doesn't look smooth on the aero bike.

 

[topt]

I simply don't understand why he is racing the aerobike in mountain stages, specially when he raced with this bike only in UAE and in the Tour

cause they managed to get it to 6.8kg, its without paint and some other stuff

 

[rafa92]

the aero bike is at 6.8kg

no it's not, in this new light weight version (with no paint) it should be around 7.1kg (there are articles on it). But it's not all about weight, it's about how comfortable you are pushing the watts. Pog has clearly some problems pushing the same watts he pushes on the road bike when he's using his TT bike, especially while climbing. And imo the same is true for his aero bike. So even if in theory the tests they are making may suggest the aero bike is faster, when he actually uses it his level is lower because of this

 

[Links2003]

UAE just *** the bed. Politt didn't do his job, once that big group went and you were not prepared to drop Sivakov back or pace with Wellens, it was over. I think its a 50/50 on the DS and Politt

After the strong tour so far to accuse Politt of not doing his job today is a strong accusation. The race was a big mess again today. It's super hard to control everything on your own. Others have even accused him of being too harsh with his rivals so that they don't ride away.
He also made sure that the main field was still able to win. If UAE had put in a second rider at some point, it would have been easily possible for Pogacar.

 

[scribers]

I knew that somebody would mention the weight.
Another super important factor is the geometry of the bike and how comfortable Pogacar is riding it.
Pogacar doesn't look smooth on the aero bike.

We were saying the same thing all the way back to UAE Tour, yet he keeps climbing back on it. And for major climbs no less. I don't think UAE would risk the tour for a marketing scheme. A loss over the machine would be catastrophic to both UAE and Colnago.

 

[Valv.Piti]

After the strong tour so far to accuse Politt of not doing his job today is a strong accusation. The race was a big mess again today. It's super hard to control everything on your own. Others have even accused him of being too harsh with his rivals so that they don't ride away.
He also made sure that the main field was still able to win. If UAE had put in a second rider at some point, it would have been easily possible for Pogacar.

Main point being that he didn't need all the shenanigans he was pulling closing people down and yelling at them. That made the rest of the field, predictably, very mad and it went from a 3 man break, to a 5 man break when Jayco went to a 38 man break. Politt is good at just riding a steady pace and he should just do that instead, then there was no problem today.

 

[scribers]

I think the performance of the team was below standards. They didn't control the break, didn't have a lot of guys around him, and the break didn't seem to help for bridge pulling.

Lidl was worse. I mean my god, get that man some intermediate points! That has to be a sour team bus atmosphere.

 

[Rou]

I see 2 factors that explain Pog's lower climbing level compared to 2024.
1. The aero bike is simply not optimal for him for climbing.
2. In 2024 since March he was doing specific climbing trainings. His level was already super high in Catalunya. In 2025 he started climbing drills in May after the Classics. This explains him being slightly worse.

 

[Valv.Piti]

The funny thing though was that it was not Lidl or UAE blocking the road (which would have made sense), but brainless Tudor and Alpecin. Extremely low IQ move. I have no clue what Lidl was even doing today tbf.

 

[Cycling111]

UAE just *** the bed. Politt didn't do his job, once that big group went and you were not prepared to drop Sivakov back or pace with Wellens, it was over. I think its a 50/50 on the DS and Politt

Politt was horrible today because of his attitude.

The one who's going to have to take the fall is Pogacar. They've already asked him questions today, and they'll ask them again tomorrow.

Politt should apologize. In the end, it's his leader who has to take the fall for him, and he should be the one to apologize for today's actions. He reminded me of Tony Martin.