{"id":701648,"date":"2026-07-20T13:59:16","date_gmt":"2026-07-20T13:59:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/701648\/"},"modified":"2026-07-20T13:59:16","modified_gmt":"2026-07-20T13:59:16","slug":"how-much-money-does-pogacar-earn-and-how-does-that-compare-to-other-sports-top-stars","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/701648\/","title":{"rendered":"How much money does Poga\u010dar earn, and how does that compare to other sports\u2019 top stars?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>In short, it\u2019s hard to say for certain how much Tadej Poga\u010dar earns \u2013 contracts and bonus arrangements are private, and sponsorship deal structures vary widely across riders. This means quoted figures are informed estimates rather than confirmed earnings.<\/p>\n<p>Still, there&#8217;s a consensus among multiple sources that he\u2019s the highest-paid rider in the sport.<\/p>\n<p>According to <a href=\"https:\/\/www.gazzetta.it\/Ciclismo\/13-10-2025\/pogacar-i-guadagni-del-campione-sloveno-tra-stipendio-e-sponsor.shtml\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\">La Gazzetta dello Sport<\/a>, Poga\u010dar earned an estimated \u20ac12 million in 2025.<\/p>\n<p>That figure includes everything \u2013 his UAE Team Emirates-XRG salary, race bonuses, personal sponsorship, and merchandising income.<\/p>\n<p>The report suggests his base contract is worth around \u20ac8 million per year, with significant bonuses layered on top. These include:<\/p>\n<p>\u20ac1 million for winning the Tour de France<br \/>\n\u20ac500,000 for the Giro d\u2019Italia and Vuelta a Espa\u00f1a<br \/>\n\u20ac250,000 for the World Championships<\/p>\n<p>After a dominant 2025 season, those bonuses helped push his total earnings well beyond his base salary.<\/p>\n<p>His deal with UAE Team Emirates-XRG runs until 2030 and includes a \u20ac200 million buyout clause, effectively tying him to the team for the foreseeable future.<\/p>\n<p>Within cycling, that puts Poga\u010dar in a league of his own.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" width=\"2560\" height=\"1707\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/Specialized-Evade-4_011-scaled.jpg\" alt=\"Remco Evenepoel of Red Bull - BORA - hansgrohe wearing the Specialized Evade 4 aero road helmet\" class=\"wp-image-975515\"\/>Other star riders, including Remco Evenepoel, earn significantly less. Specialized<\/p>\n<p>The same report lists Remco Evenepoel on \u20ac6.6 million and Jonas Vingegaard on \u20ac5 million, while stars such as Mathieu van der Poel, Wout van Aert and Primo\u017e Rogli\u010d earn around \u20ac4 million.<\/p>\n<p>Further down the ladder, the average WorldTour salary is listed at roughly \u20ac538,000 \u2013 not bad, but not \u20ac10 million.<\/p>\n<p>Domestiques \u2013 the riders who support their team leaders \u2013 are estimated to earn, on average, less than \u20ac150,000 per year.<\/p>\n<p>Again, that\u2019s a decent wedge compared to the average wage of even the wealthiest EU nations \u2013 <a href=\"https:\/\/www.euronews.com\/business\/2025\/11\/09\/equivalised-net-income-across-europe-where-do-households-earn-the-most\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\">Euronews<\/a> reports the median income for residents of Luxembourg in 2025 as \u20ac50,799 \u2013 but, naturally, the biggest stars attract the chunkiest pay packets.<\/p>\n<p><a\/>What about other sports?<br \/>\n<img loading=\"lazy\" width=\"1024\" height=\"683\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/GettyImages-2284975787.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-983237\"\/>Poga\u010dar\u2019s earnings are small change compared to Cristiano Ronaldo&#8217;s estimated $275m. Ryan Pierse &#8211; FIFA\/FIFA via Getty Images<\/p>\n<p>While Poga\u010dar\u2019s earnings are exceptional within cycling, they&#8217;re dwarfed by the fearsome amounts paid to the biggest stars in other sports.<\/p>\n<p>Cristiano Ronaldo topped the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.forbes.com\/sites\/brettknight\/2025\/05\/15\/the-worlds-10-highest-paid-athletes-2025\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\">2025 Forbes list for the highest-paid athletes<\/a>, earning \u201can estimated $275 million before taxes and agent fees\u201d.<\/p>\n<p>Tennis tells a similar story. Novak Djokovic is listed in the same report as netting total earnings comfortably surpassing $30 million in 2025.<\/p>\n<p>So why does the biggest star in cycling earn so much less than other sports?<\/p>\n<p>The key difference is scale. Cycling\u2019s financial ecosystem is far smaller than football or tennis, with less broadcast revenue and fewer global sponsorship deals feeding into team budgets.<\/p>\n<p>Prize money underlines the same point.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" width=\"1536\" height=\"1024\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/Colnago-Richard-Mille_-08_crop.jpg\" alt=\"Colnago x Richard Mille RM 64-01 Tourbillon Colnago watch\" class=\"wp-image-981222\"\/>The latest Richard Mille watch would take a chunk out of even Poga\u010dar\u2019s salary. Colnago<\/p>\n<p>Winning the Tour de France earns a rider \u20ac500,000 \u2013 enough for a &#8216;cheap&#8217; $350,000 watch from Poga\u010dar\u2019s sponsor, Richard Mille, but not the brand&#8217;s <a href=\"https:\/\/www.bikeradar.com\/news\/colnago-richard-mille-watch-pogacar\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">latest chronograph<\/a> \u2013 with a total prize pot of around \u20ac2.57 million spread across the race. That\u2019s a lot of cash, but modest by global sporting standards.<\/p>\n<p>The Wimbledon champions earned \u00a33 million in 2025, while golf\u2019s US Open paid $4.3 million to its winner. At sea angling&#8217;s 2022 White Marlin Open, Jeremy Duffie netted a world-record-setting $4,536,000 for landing a 77.5lb white marlin.<\/p>\n<p>More Tour de France questions answered<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"In short, it\u2019s hard to say for certain how much Tadej Poga\u010dar earns \u2013 contracts and bonus arrangements&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":701649,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[37],"tags":[4985,101,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-701648","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-cycling","tag-cycling","tag-sports","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/701648","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=701648"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/701648\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/701649"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=701648"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=701648"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=701648"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}