Teams & Riders Tadej Pogačar discussion thread

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"First of all I have to say a really big thank you to the guys. I wanted to win for them because they worked well throughout the stages. At the end there was a meter or so to 'respect'. As Williams let go I heard him tell Schultz to go. Sam I tacticed a bit if Valter and Kuss would cover Schultz, but he got the difference. The group stopped a bit, we looked at each other and it was already too late. Still, it was a good day for me, I have the right legs and I'm already looking forward to the next stages."
Sound and fair assessment. You dont hear him being heated or blaming anyone else.

Two big stages coming up now!
 
Pogacar is in very good shape, but Schultz was too strong for him.

View: https://twitter.com/ammattipyoraily/status/1769785492063580607


Schultz did the famous 8.5 w/kg. 578/68=8.5 w/kg.

Mou was right all along, but he was talking about Schultz.

It was a sprint. Irrelevant to w/kg. I watched the final. What is noteworthy is how easy it looked for Pog and nobody else in the chasing pack was close. Pog's finishing on stages like this is like Valverde in his best days. Kudos to Shultz for going early and giving Pog too much to do.
 
It was a sprint. Irrelevant to w/kg. I watched the final. What is noteworthy is how easy it looked for Pog and nobody else in the chasing pack was close. Pog's finishing on stages like this is like Valverde in his best days. Kudos to Shultz for going early and giving Pog too much to do.
Pogi did a tatical mistake. He should had followed Schultz, or start the sprint more soon, and he would had won the stage.
 
Pogi did a tatical mistake. He should had followed Schultz, or start the sprint more soon, and he would had won the stage.
This happens in road racing all the time. You can't get it right every time. Plus, as others noted UAE did a poor job. They should have set a pace on the front which made it impossible for Shultz to launch from. Anyway, I doubt Pog is losing any sleep. He stayed out of trouble which was the main thing in a stage like that.
 
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Mar 23, 2023
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So three possibilities:
1. Wins everything (boring for a lot of people;off to the Clinic)
2. Someone beats him in a uneventful and unimportant stage = he's washed (or doesn't produce 8.5W/kg; although @mou said he's spicing things up)
3. Wins everything including Giro, looses Tour (because of bad cornering and changing of TT bike, heat, 2000m altitude, blablabla)
Did I forget something?
 
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It all sounds a little odd but I guess that some of those greater talents have managed to get around poorer / lesser training regimes simply by applying their "talent". In other words only when they faced defeat something had to change, eg. Pog in MSR, MVDP in CX (WC 2017 and 2018), WVA in some late Monuments etc. So maybe not so strange that Pog has decided to become more structured about his training and really is trying to become his very best. It should be a scary thought to the competition that up until this year he was simply waltzing around having fun on a bike but has now decided to become a serious pro. I hope Mou is right and that Pog puts Visma and Vingo to the test
Tadej is mature enough to understand his limits, I'd guess. That and the finite number of opportunities he'd get to win each race now that every other rider and team is specifically racing against him most of the time.
I was of the opinion that his team came up seriously weak in today's stage but it's refreshing the Pogacar took responsibility for sitting on the Bora leadout too long. Ignore the fact he didn't have a teammate in the time zone of the sprint; he still had the attitude that he was responsible.
You don't hear that from many guys; particularly after getting nipped in a 300km race where everyone soiled themselves every time he twitched.
The GTs are team races and he'll need those guys to be rested and ready; not sitting at 50th place in the pack.
 
Marc Hirschi (UAE) is set to join Tudor in 2025. Ok, not Pogacar news but since Hirschi's non-showings as domeatique were a topic, I'll post it here.
Tadej is mature enough to understand his limits, I'd guess. That and the finite number of opportunities he'd get to win each race now that every other rider and team is specifically racing against him most of the time.
I was of the opinion that his team came up seriously weak in today's stage but it's refreshing the Pogacar took responsibility for sitting on the Bora leadout too long. Ignore the fact he didn't have a teammate in the time zone of the sprint; he still had the attitude that he was responsible.
You don't hear that from many guys; particularly after getting nipped in a 300km race where everyone soiled themselves every time he twitched.
The GTs are team races and he'll need those guys to be rested and ready; not sitting at 50th place in the pack.
The thing is in 3 out of 4 Tours he had useless teams as well and its not even that the names were so bad - wonder why UAE messes up prep seemingly compared to lets say Visma, where you just know that whoever is in the lineup, they will do their job. No complaints about last year UAE though.
 
Marc Hirschi (UAE) is set to join Tudor in 2025. Ok, not Pogacar news but since Hirschi's non-showings as domeatique were a topic, I'll post it here.

The thing is in 3 out of 4 Tours he had useless teams as well and its not even that the names were so bad - wonder why UAE messes up prep seemingly compared to lets say Visma, where you just know that whoever is in the lineup, they will do their job. No complaints about last year UAE though.
because the head of performance was Inigo San Millan, and because he led every altitude camp personally....
 
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The thing is in 3 out of 4 Tours he had useless teams as well and its not even that the names were so bad - wonder why UAE messes up prep seemingly compared to lets say Visma, where you just know that whoever is in the lineup, they will do their job. No complaints about last year UAE though.
In 2022 wasn’t really their fault though and we couldn’t see how good or bad the team actually was, they got decimated by crashes and Covid.