Teams & Riders Tadej Pogačar discussion thread

[Cycling111]

If you don't believe there's room for improvement, then why do you insist Remco has a chance of winning the Tour? Because that would require a much greater level of improvement.

By the way, Remco's climbing level in the 2024 Tour was far superior to his usual climbing level.
Remco, who has climbing difficulties, climbed faster than Pantani. Analyze that since it's so interesting to you. I find more remarkable Remco climbing faster than Pantani that Pogacar and Vingeggaard did it.

What's tiresome is that in other threads, especially Remco's thread, you get annoyed by unfavorable opinions, but then you're the first to say and insinuate worse things in this thread.

How boring. Just assume Pogacsr is in the situation you expected Remco to be in. Then there'd be no complaints.

 

[Charlyghoul]

Also apart Van der Poel the classics field is poorer than in past eras, Pogacar basically has one very good rival in the classics and one in the tour.
Like i said for an era of specialism this is pretty bad

 

[Cycling111]

his jump from 2023 is not as big at is seems. In 2023 he had an injury in the middle of the season who influenced his level in the tour. Despite that in the first two weeks of the tour he was still able to produce his best performances ever (at that point) on long climbs. Plus in the spring of 2023 his level was already super high, he won flanders and without the crash in liege he would have easily completed the ardennes treble. Then with the new trainer he increased his level in 2024 but not by that much compared to 2023 considering the injury. The jump from 2023-2024 is easily explainable

Pogacar's level in 2023 before the crash was impressive, yes.

He won De Ronde by a landslide.

By the way, since we're talking about De Ronde.
At 30, Pedersen has taken a major level up. In 2023, Pedersen needed a 3-minute advantage in a breakaway to get on the podium. This year, Pedersen fought for the podium head-to-head with the best.
A huge leap. And what he did in Ghent was at a much higher level than other years. His performance at the Giro, al ITT... 30 years.

And VDP improved his level considerably since 2023, at 28 years.
But Pedersen's performance this year has been more evident.

We're not going to mention Vingegaard, who went from being a domestique to a two Tour de France winner agnainst a generational rider. Or, as previously mentioned, someone like Remco goes from having climbing problems to climbing a Tour de France better than Pantani.

The boring thing is seeing the same people in this thread complaining about not accepting that Remco isn't the new Merckxs and that there's another cyclist doing what they thought he would do. Meanwhile, in the Remco thread, they're asking for respect.

 

[Ulle97]

Before his thoughts about retirement, I really thought 11 GTs or 19 monuments were reachable. MVP is getting older and Pogacar is getting better year after year. I was pretty sure he would reach his best level in 2026-2028. It's not unrealistic he would win 4 GTs or 6 monuments in this period.
Then he would only need 2 GTs or 4 monuments after 2028. This is not that difficult for a rider like Teddy.

If he wants to get 11GTs he'll need to target a couple of Vueltas.
Handy enough to pick up a title there.

I think he can get 6 Tours.

 

[Copperberg]

Well how much do you think he needs ?

I think you missed the point with my post, 75% was not the important number at all...
I just wanted to highlight a probelm with comparing today with Merckx Era, what was allowed back then isnt allowed today. If Pogacar does what Merckx did he will get banned for life.

 

[Charlyghoul]

I think you missed the point with my post, 75% was not the important number at all...
I just wanted to highlight a probelm with comparing today with Merckx Era, what was allowed back then isnt allowed today. If Pogacar does what Merckx did he will get banned for life.

Why what did Merckx do?

 

[Peyroteo94]

If he wants to get 11GTs he'll need to target a couple of Vueltas.
Handy enough to pick up a title there.

I think he can get 6 Tours.

I see 2 obstacles:
- Crashes
- Motivation

If he can still be happy and go hard on training without crashing in the next 4 years, he will reach 11 GTs.

 

[Charlyghoul]

Merckx beat De Vlaeminck by over 5 minutes for one f his roubaix’s, Can Pog do that to Van der poel ?
He beat Gimondi by over 5 minutes in one of his flanders wins, third place rider was also Italian, hardly a Belgian national champs.

11 gt’s , hour record…all this with a permanent injury. Pog can’t do these things
Merckx is simply the best to ever do it

 

[Copperberg]

Why what did Merckx do?

If you want to discuss that we are in the wrong part of the forums...

 

[Charlyghoul]

If you want to discuss that we are in the wrong part of the forums...

Indeed that goes for the two of them 😏

 

[Ulle97]

I see 2 obstacles:
- Crashes
- Motivation

If he can still be happy and go hard on training without crashing in the next 4 years, he will reach 11 GTs.

He can do it. He will need to target 2 in the same year.
Tour-Vuelta.
Or perhaps even a Giro-Vuelta. Although I can't envisage a Tour without Pogi there.

 

[Peyroteo94]

He can do it. He will need to target 2 in the same year.
Tour-Vuelta.
Or perhaps even a Giro-Vuelta. Although I can't envisage a Tour without Pogi there.

I'm counting on 4 GTs until October 2028. This is my prediction. After this date, he only needs 2 GTs.

 

[Charlyghoul]

I'm counting on 4 GTs until October 2028. This is my prediction. After this date, he only needs 2 GTs.

At least he has poor competition in the other grand tours compared to Eddy, to make it easier for him..look at who Eddy beat for his Vuelta, Ocana and Thevenet. Prime Gimondi was his main rival in the giro.
Pog had to beat Martinez and a 38 year old Thomas for his giro…
A stronger modern era, indeed

 

[Charlyghoul]

Pog should thank his lucky stars he has Vingegaard honestly

 

[Charlyghoul]

If you want to discuss that we are in the wrong part of the forums...

The question is in the clinic , oblige me

 

[Copperberg]

The question is in the clinic , oblige me

Sorry to disappoint you, wish we had the ability to use PM as this is a bit off topic. Innocent until proven guilty is something I value. My personal opinion about a rider means nothing. I will leave it with that said.
Take care and enjoy life...

 

[Peyroteo94]

At least he has poor competition in the other grand tours compared to Eddy, to make it easier for him..look at who Eddy beat for his Vuelta, Ocana and Thevenet. Prime Gimondi was his main rival in the giro.
Pog had to beat Martinez and a 38 year old Thomas for his giro…
A stronger modern era, indeed

I already got your point. I disagree with you. Let's not have an endless debate about this.

 

[Krzysztof_O]

I just don't know if he is willing enough to go hard on training anymore. He misses that little spark.

I havent seen it in results. Great season and the Tour won convincingly against well prepared Vingo. If he loses WC and Lombardy then we can talk about a deflation. So far only words. I get that he may not want to go on after turning 30 as he started winning big very early.

 

[Shortcut]

God help me, how discussions can twist and turn in strange directions. A few days ago, I read how the Djokovic/Nadal/Federer era was supposedly bad… because they won everything, and that’s why Djokovic isn’t the GOAT, and that the real tennis GOAT is Serena (looking at tennis overall) because she didn’t have such weak competition and even though she won one Grand Slam less ??? Now I’m reading that Pogačar has weak competition, even though just a year ago it was clearly a top 6 group (Pogi, Jonas, Remco, Primož, WVA, MVDP), and it was considered one of the strongest generations. Because two of them started to pull ahead (also due to injuries to the others), suddenly it’s a weak generation ?? Someone also wrote that Pogačar lost and was twice second at the Tour (terribly bad) and that because of this he can no longer be in the GOAT discussion.
Pogačar is the GOAT because he is a total anomaly in modern cycling and does things that haven’t happened in the last 40 years. When Merckx was racing, cycling was seriously practiced in only 5 countries, and everyone rode all the races. An MvDP back then would have ridden everything, same with Jonas, Remco… and because of that, Pogačar would have won even more. Now, he has to beat a 15 kg heavier and fresh MvDP in the spring, a fresh Jonas in the summer, Remco in the Ardennes classics, and at the end of the year everyone again at the Worlds with a national team that can barely put together a squad.
I’m certain that if Remco had Pogačar’s achievements, he would have already been crowned the greatest of all time a year ago.

 

[Ulle97]

God help me, how discussions can twist and turn in strange directions. A few days ago, I read how the Djokovic/Nadal/Federer era was supposedly bad… because they won everything, and that’s why Djokovic isn’t the GOAT, and that the real tennis GOAT is Serena (looking at tennis overall) because she didn’t have such weak competition and even though she won one Grand Slam less ??? Now I’m reading that Pogačar has weak competition, even though just a year ago it was clearly a top 6 group (Pogi, Jonas, Remco, Primož, WVA, MVDP), and it was considered one of the strongest generations. Because two of them started to pull ahead (also due to injuries to the others), suddenly it’s a weak generation ?? Someone also wrote that Pogačar lost and was twice second at the Tour (terribly bad) and that because of this he can no longer be in the GOAT discussion.
Pogačar is the GOAT because he is a total anomaly in modern cycling and does things that haven’t happened in the last 40 years. When Merckx was racing, cycling was seriously practiced in only 5 countries, and everyone rode all the races. An MvDP back then would have ridden everything, same with Jonas, Remco… and because of that, Pogačar would have won even more. Now, he has to beat a 15 kg heavier and fresh MvDP in the spring, a fresh Jonas in the summer, Remco in the Ardennes classics, and at the end of the year everyone again at the Worlds with a national team that can barely put together a squad.
I’m certain that if Remco had Pogačar’s achievements, he would have already been crowned the greatest of all time a year ago.

To be fair Pogacar, is 26. He has achieved an awful lot in this time.
I think Merckx is still the greatest of all time. We can't blame him that cycling wasn't as worldwide as it is today. He beat what was put in front of him. And dominated.

The biggest compliment we can give Pogi is that he is compared to Merckx when he barely halfway through his career. We never thought we'd ever compare a rider to Merckx again as no rider in 40 years has really come close to him.

If he continues on his current path for 3-4 more seasons I think he'll surpass Merckx in the opinions of many, even if he doesn't clock up Merckx's record of 19 monuments or 11 GT wins.

 

[Charlyghoul]

God help me, how discussions can twist and turn in strange directions. A few days ago, I read how the Djokovic/Nadal/Federer era was supposedly bad… because they won everything, and that’s why Djokovic isn’t the GOAT, and that the real tennis GOAT is Serena (looking at tennis overall) because she didn’t have such weak competition and even though she won one Grand Slam less ??? Now I’m reading that Pogačar has weak competition, even though just a year ago it was clearly a top 6 group (Pogi, Jonas, Remco, Primož, WVA, MVDP), and it was considered one of the strongest generations. Because two of them started to pull ahead (also due to injuries to the others), suddenly it’s a weak generation ?? Someone also wrote that Pogačar lost and was twice second at the Tour (terribly bad) and that because of this he can no longer be in the GOAT discussion.
Pogačar is the GOAT because he is a total anomaly in modern cycling and does things that haven’t happened in the last 40 years. When Merckx was racing, cycling was seriously practiced in only 5 countries, and everyone rode all the races. An MvDP back then would have ridden everything, same with Jonas, Remco… and because of that, Pogačar would have won even more. Now, he has to beat a 15 kg heavier and fresh MvDP in the spring, a fresh Jonas in the summer, Remco in the Ardennes classics, and at the end of the year everyone again at the Worlds with a national team that can barely put together a squad.
I’m certain that if Remco had Pogačar’s achievements, he would have already been crowned the greatest of all time a year ago.

No what annoys ‘old timers’ is that the current generation of fans devalue Merckx and Hinault’s achievements, you’ve just done it yourself.
Cycling can be practiced in Kiribati , it doesn’t mean the competition is any better now. It certainly doesn’t mean the competition was bad in other eras.

Sticking just to the tour for a moment, I say again, with Vingegaard you can argue that there is better competition now at the tour for Pog, but take him away where’s the strength in depth? Nobody else is remotely capable of challenging for the tour.

There are two great tour riders now, Pog and ving, in Merckx era there were several, Merckx, Zoetemelk, Poulidor, Van Impe, Ocaña, Gimondi.
All of those riders were consistent challengers, all of them won the tour except Poulidor who was on the podium many times.
There is nobody outside the big two in the last five years who has been consistent, I think that’s damning on modern cycling.

It depends what you think is better, two great riders, or a bigger group of challengers.

I think at the very least you can say Merckx era was no ‘worse’ than the current era.

This is without getting in to the classics where once again the competition was, if not better, at least as good.
Recency bias is a big thing in any sport, just think for a moment if you took Pog or ving away, the tour would be dreadful. Even now some are saying it’s boring, it’d be ten times worse without one of those two.

 

[Charlyghoul]

Merckx is the goat because he did things that haven’t been done by anyone…
And Djokovic is the tennis goat

 

[BubbaChuck]

If you do any serius analysis of 60s,those numbers simply are not worth same as today.lets be serius.

 

[Charlyghoul]

To be fair Pogacar, is 26. He has achieved an awful lot in this time.
I think Merckx is still the greatest of all time. We can't blame him that cycling wasn't as worldwide as it is today. He beat what was put in front of him. And dominated.

The biggest compliment we can give Pogi is that he is compared to Merckx when he barely halfway through his career. We never thought we'd ever compare a rider to Merckx again as no rider in 40 years has really come close to him.

If he continues on his current path for 3-4 more seasons I think he'll surpass Merckx in the opinions of many, even if he doesn't clock up Merckx's record of 19 monuments or 11 GT wins.

Spot on

 

[Charlyghoul]

If you do any serius analysis of 60s,those numbers simply are not worth same as today.lets be serius.

Why ? Where do you think Oscar onley would finish in the 70s tours?
It’s fair to say that Pog doesn’t need Eddys numbers to compare, but he needs a lot more than what he has now. Cycling didn’t start in 2020.
He still hasn’t won arguably the biggest two monuments, has only won as many grand tours as Roglic and Gimondi, less than Contador and Froome…much less Merckx or Hinault
I’m more and more surprised, looking at the numbers, how anyone can call Pog the goat yet