RTV SLO<\/a>, the UAE Team Emirates-XRG leader once again highlighted the toll that winning the Tour had taken on him, describing it as, \u201creally tough, one of the hardest ones I\u2019ve ridden, which can be confirmed by everyone who fought for the overall ranking.\u201d<\/p>\nPressed on his previous comments about retiring, he confirmed that this has been in his thoughts, but that it\u2019s likely to be a good few years ahead yet.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe fact is, I\u2019m counting the years until I\u2019m retired. I started winning early, and there may be worse results, I\u2019m ready for anything,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m sure I\u2019ll ride some of the Tours, even though you can never say that you\u2019re going to perform there. The Tour is the biggest race and I doubt that the team will leave me home for several years yet.\u201d<\/p>\n
Two weeks on from that fourth yellow jersey success, Poga\u010dar says he\u2019s now well rested and has reset his focus.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m ready for new fights,\u201d he stated. Having decided against trying to win a first Vuelta a Espa\u00f1a title, his sights are now set on this coming week\u2019s Canadian WorldTour races in Montreal and Quebec, as well as the European and World Championships.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe know that Montreal suits me better, but that doesn\u2019t mean that I won\u2019t try to win in Quebec as well,\u201d said Poga\u010dar, who\u2019s won the former race twice but has never finished on the podium in Quebec.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis year they\u2019ve changed the route a bit, now it\u2019s even easier, but the goal is more difficult, so we\u2019ll try to win there too. It doesn\u2019t have to be me, we have a few more racers who can meet this goal, especially Jhonathan Narvaez.\u201d<\/p>\n
Beyond that, he will be aiming to defend the world road title in Kigali, Rwanda and then take a first European Road Race Championship victory in the Ard\u00e8che region of France. \u201cAccording to the information we have, this year the European Championship will suit climbers, so I\u2019ll probably be there.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s similar to one of the spring races won by Juan Ayuso this year. But this European Championship probably means I won\u2019t be able to do any of the Italian Classics except for Lombardy.\u201d<\/p>\n
Although he\u2019s missing the Vuetla, Poga\u010dar said that he\u2019ll be keeping an eye on events in the season\u2019s third Grand Tour, which starts in two weeks with his rival Jonas Vingegaard as the favorite for victory in the world champion\u2019s absence. He\u2019s hoping that his UAE teammates Jo\u00e3o Almeida and Juan Ayuso can beat Visma-Lease a Bike\u2019s Danish leader, but admits that it\u2019ll be a tough task. \u201cIf Almeida hadn\u2019t fallen at the Tour, he could, but I don\u2019t know,\u201d said Poga\u010dar.<\/p>\n
After an afternoon ride showing his home roads around Komenda to French teammate Pavel Sivakov, Poga\u010dar claimed what was his first victory in his eponymous race, finishing ahead of Jayco-AlUla\u2019s Lula Mezgec and Tudor\u2019s Matteo Trentin.<\/p>\n
\u201cI wanted to win, especially in front of such a crowd of fans who gathered today. It\u2019s amazing, there weren\u2019t so many spectators when the Tour of Slovenia was held here. The fans gave me extra motivation and I\u2019m really happy that I won,\u201d said Poga\u010dar, who\u2019ll now be looking for a third GP Montreal success Tuesday.<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"“], “filter”: { “nextExceptions”: “img, blockquote, div”, “nextContainsExceptions”: “img, blockquote, a.btn, a.o-button”} }”> Tadej Poga\u010dar has been in…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":58324,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[37],"tags":[4985,101,8782,6549,31704,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-58323","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-cycling","tag-cycling","tag-sports","tag-tadej-pogacar","tag-tour-de-france","tag-uae-team-emirates","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/58323","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=58323"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/58323\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/58324"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=58323"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=58323"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=58323"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}