"If anyone knows how to beat Pogacar, I would love to hear it": the World Champion demoralizes his rivals

They have tried everything and nothing seems to work. Tadej Pogacar is simply the best cyclist of the moment, something that, with performances like the latest one in the 2025 European Cycling Championship, is beginning to provoke some frustration among his rivals who cannot find the recipe to harm him while trying to convince themselves that another scenario would have been possible.

The best in the peloton seek ways to beat Tadej Pogacar

Only in certain moments of history, every few decades, does a cyclist appear so superior to his rivals that he ends up crushing their morale in the face of the impossibility of beating him by any means. You only have to look back to remember the eras of Fausto Coppi, Jacques Anquetil, of course, Eddy Merckx and, to a lesser extent, of great monsters like Bernard Hinault or Miguel Indurain.

Now we live under the dictatorship of Tadej Pogacar and the words of Belgian cyclist Louis Vervaeke after finishing the European Championship and being asked about the Belgian team's tactics could not be more eloquent “What could we have done differently? If someone can tell me how to beat Tadej today, I would love to hear it”.

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During these last two seasons, we have seen practically everything to try to beat Tadej Pogacar. For example, in the Tour de France, Visma-Lease a Bike bet on making the race as tough as possible every day. In addition, Jonas Vingegaard worked on his explosiveness to be able to withstand the tough changes of pace of the Slovenian. In the end, in the first big mountain stage, with a finish in Hautacam, the Dutch team ended up exploding and Vingegaard was not able to follow his rival on a long and tough climb where two years earlier he had made Tadej Pogacar kneel.

They have also tried to leave him isolated and without teammates to rely on, something that their rivals have achieved relatively easily, especially when the competition takes place with national teams as in the European and World Championships. However, this has only led to Tadej anticipating his attacks even more, regardless of whether there are more than 100 kilometers left to the finish.

Of course, all of them have believed, with their numbers in hand, that they could follow the Slovenian. Hold on to his wheel and leave all the work to him to finish him off. But all of them have ended up exploding due to the high cruising speed that Tadej Pogacar is capable of sustaining. Recent examples include Ayuso and Isaac del Toro in the World Championships or Remco in the European Championships.

In fact, only Mathieu van der Poel, in the Milan-San Remo has managed to beat Tadej Pogacar in a face-to-face battle in the last two years, but of course, it had to be in a race where the climbing characteristics of the Slovenian take a back seat and the race is decided by sheer power and the ability to be fast in a sprint after 300 kilometers on the bike, and there the Belgian did not take any prisoners. In fact, the Classicissima is currently the last great challenge that Tadej Pogacar has on his record. A thorn in his side that has surely become a small obsession and led him this year to try a tactic that seemed unthinkable and allowed us to enjoy a memorable Milan-San Remo.

But that will be next season, there is still one last event on Tadej Pogacar's calendar. It is, of course, Il Lombardia, which could be the third monument conquered by the UAE Team Emirates-XRG cyclist this season and which, right now, no one doubts that, unless there is an incident like a puncture or a fall, he will also win with the same authority shown in the World and European Championships. By the way, a victory in this edition of Il Lombardia would mean the fifth consecutive one for Tadej Pogacar and would allow him to equal the record of wins in the race held by the legendary Fausto Coppi.