THEMOVE - 2025 Il Lombardia Breakdown | THEMOVE

Episode Date: October 11, 2025

Johan Bruyneel, George Hincapie, and Spencer Martin break down Tadej Pogačar’s stunning win at Il Lombardia, with Remco Evenepoel racking up another impressive second place behind. They analyze how all rivals are powerless to stop Pogačar from executing long-range breakaways, even though they know it is coming, attempt to put his performance into historical context, discuss what is left for him to win, and what the others can do to topple him in the future. Become a WEDŪ Member Today to Unlock VIP Access & Benefits: https://access.wedu.team NordVPN:Get your Exclusive NordVPN deal here → https://nordvpn.com/themove It’s risk-free with Nord’s 30-day money-back guarantee! Link is in the episode show notes. LMNT:Get a free 8-count Sample Pack of LMNT’s most popular drink mix flavors with any purchase at https://DRINKLMNT.COM/THEMOVE Find your favorite LMNT flavor, or share with a friend. Be sure to try the LMNT Sparkling — a bold, 16-ounce can of sparkling electrolyte water. AG1: Head to HTTPS://DrinkAG1.com/themoveto get a FREE Welcome Kit, including a bottle of Vitamin D and 5 AG1 Travel Packs (a $76 value), when you first subscribe! Helix Sleep: Their extended LABOR DAY SALE is ending September 30th. 25% off all orders on the site Go to https://HelixSleep.com/TheMove. Make sure you enter our show name after checkout so they know we sent you!

There's only one way that there might be a possibility. And I've always said, you know, Pogacar on top of his form, his strongest, his worst enemy is himself. And so I think what they should try to do, especially in monuments, like 250K, is, you know, try to isolate him early, to make him attack early and then not race behind and try to keep it together. and hope that he will be overconfident and runs out of gas. It has happened in the past a few times, but it seems that now, especially this year, he has that exercise under control even. You know, he does not run out of energy anymore.

Everybody, welcome back to the move. I'm Spencer Martin. I'm here with Johan Burneal and George Hinkapi. We are breaking down I, Lombardia, which was won by Tade Pagachar in his now signature solo style. His UAE team lined it up perfect for him on the

Paso de Ganda. He launched his lethal attack. Everyone knew it was coming. No one could stop it. Gets his fifth straight Lombardio win. Tenth career monument at just 27 years old. Remko Evanapole, his biggest rival and greatest foil, up to, I guess at this

point, finishes yet another second with a great ride. Michael Store from Tudor Procycling gets an incredible third place, his first top 10 in a world tour one day race. Quinn Simmons, the American on Little Trek, who was attacked from the gun, finished fourth, which is incredible. And then Pagacchar's young UAE teammate, Isaac D'Oro, finished fifth in the chase group. But Johan, I and George, I want to get your guys' take on this win, what this means going

forward, how does Pagatja keep doing this? How are we ever going to stop him or how will anyone ever stop him? But first, let's hear from our partners. and then I'll get your take on it. Everybody, this episode is brought to you by NordVPN, a must have for any serious cycling fans. What I love most about NordVPN is the freedom it gives me with NordVPN. I can safely access my favorite streams and cycling coverage that I watch at home,

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An Element will refund you, no questions asked. asked right now you can get a free eight count sample pack of elements most popular flavors with any purchase at drink elements which is l mn t dot com slash the move that's drink l mn t dot com slash the move all right yohan do you want to go first what's your big takeaway from this win that i think came exactly as you predicted in yesterday's show sorry i was my my my mic wasn't along um my um i was like man he's thinking yeah yeah i was thinking well i mean there's two there's two things i i want to address uh before we go into the you know what happened and how polachar won and uh how the race uh developed um when i started

watching i started watching pretty early so we had we had these 14 riders go away from from very early on some strong riders in there and my thing and i still cannot i don't have an answer yet but my take of the day would be a part of of course the the the the pogashar show what the fuck was red bull bora doing today what was that i mean why i cannot understand um they straight away they started uh collaborating with uae And I mean, my only explanation is, okay, Roglitz must have said he felt great. Turned out he didn't, but you know, you don't know that at the start. And then basically, you know, the purpose could be, okay, let's just please make sure that

Polachar doesn't get isolated too soon because that's when he goes. And that would have been one climb earlier. Other than that, I mean, I don't know what you guys think, but what was the thinking behind that collaboration so early and basically during the whole race georgia i mean i think we're looking for change in tactics i think you can maybe say like the european championships why is the belgian team doing all this work when they know what peccartre's going to do but i think we're just witness in such dominance that no matter what tactics are played it's not going to be much difference i mean you see a guy like pavla zivok pulling for like 60k keeping a breakaway of you know

seven, eight, nine guys. That's a really strong breakaway at two and a half, three minutes by himself. That team is thus far just been unstoppable. Pocuchar just goes when he wants. I don't know what the tactic was from Bora by starting to collaborate with them early on. Maybe, you know, we all know how those roads are a twisty tourney, maybe just giving their guys a little bit of freedom in the beginning just to not fight for position. But, yeah, it doesn't make much sense to help out such a dominant team.

What? Yeah. I mean, am I at a line for thinking, Johan, that this was, I want to be careful how to phrase this. Was this an agreement that maybe will be paid back next year? It was something going on there behind the scenes? Because in the race, I don't really understand it. Spencer, if you asked me that question 15, 20 years ago, I would say maybe. In today's cycling, this is no way. Every race starts from scratch and everybody rides from themselves. There is, I mean, what kind of agreement can there be? I mean, it's like, UAE doesn't need to make agreements with anybody. They have three guys in the top 10 today. Maybe it was, that's a very good point.

Why do you need friends when you have all the good riders? Maybe it was, we will promise not to send Taday to the Giro next year if you help us pull. Frankly, the funniest thing about it was, I don't even think they needed the help, right? Yeah. I yeah it was strange we should say why was red bull pulling because and I I think we're seeing the future with this the start of the race was like the start of a of a two to a friend of a three hour trude of front stage it was full gas quin simmons attacks from the gun gets away with an incredibly strong group including Felipe ogana and two other enos riders like these guys clearly understand the assignment we can't beat bagcha from the peloton the only chance is to get out in front and hope you they make a miscalculation. And Simmons, I mean, after being out in front, almost six hours, gets fourth place. That's certainly better than he would have gotten had he ridden from the Peloton.

Do you guys think this is a trend that riders will just start going from the gun? Because there's no hope in race is this hard. Or is this an outlier because Simmons is on incredible form? But, we listen, Spencer, Spencer, Simmons is on incredible form. I'm just pulling up a stat here from Velong. right so they have obviously they have the teams that are part of vellon have these GPSs and they get all the metrics life during the race so i saw this here says what it takes to be in the breakaway in a monument queen simmons first 20 kilometers in the breakaway 24 minutes average speed 49.8 kilometers per hour not flat maximum speed 79.2 and here it comes average power during 25 minutes 380 watts in the break maximum power 950 watts uh you know i mean go from the gun is one thing but you have to be damn strong to be there i mean these guys were no panic cooking you know there was

some really really strong riders in that break and uh and it shows i mean that how these these numbers you show how how strong quinn was and then finally to to make it over the over that climb uh i would say in a podium position almost right i mean he he he almost made it but uh he almost made it yeah to the the the rider who attacked at kilometer zero today finished fourth in lombardy that's quite something yeah and now to me that was the ride of the day um like you said you on holding that type of power in the first 25 kilometers yeah maybe many people in the peloton can do that but to hang on to fourth place with the team like ua and pulling full gas behind dropping the riders that he dropped. I mean, we're an incredible last part of the year, Quinn Simmons is at. He didn't

have his best whirls, but unbelievable ride today. Bride of the day, in my opinion. I mean, the Paso de la Crosheta, which is 12K long, he, according to the on-screen graphics, average 450 watts for that. So not only is he doing 380 watts for the first 25 minutes. Now, okay, so maybe some people can do that. It's like, all right, then you're out front all day. then you get to a long climb just hold 450 watts on that and then he keeps going i mean he was still putting out power all the way to the end it is an incredible ride but i think i mean pogatcher is undefeated in the last two years and races with more than one day races with more than 4 000 of climbing he's only lost two one day races with more than 3 000 meters of climbing one of those

he gifted to mcnulty the other one was amstab gold which came a week after peri ruby with those facts, I mean, if you're the second favorite, you might have to start attacking from the gun. I don't see any other way to stop this. We should say, Remko Evanapol has adopted incredible discipline. It's, I guess, the opposite of the Simmons strategy where he's, I didn't, I forgot he was in this race for the first few hours, sitting in the group, sits on Pagotcha's wheel. He's holding the gaps somewhat. He's dropping everybody else, but then he's still following short. I mean, what advice could you give to Remko, you guys? Do you think there's, there's anything he could adjust to beat Pagotcha or just hope Pagachar gets sick one time?

I mean, I think he just, he's doing where he can. And, you know, second place, he's leaving his team honoruli, given the number of results in a World Cup. Obviously, he wanted to win, but he just hasn't been able to keep out with Pocachar. And maybe in the back of his mind, he thinks, well, maybe next year with this, maybe if I'm a little bit stronger and I have some guys that can stay with me a bit longer. Maybe if I don't go with Pokachar, I can have these guys help me bridge back up. I mean, there's just, he has to start thinking out of the box. And I think the fact that he's going to a new team with much better climbers around him can give him some hope and he can get some positivity out of that. Yeah, right now, Spencer, I think,

I mean, just just thinking out loud, you know, I mean, there's only one one way that they're might be a possibility. And I've always said, you know, Pogacar on top of his form, his, his strongest, his worst enemy is himself. And so I think what they should try to do, especially in monuments, like 250K, is, you know, try to isolate him early, to make him attack early and then not race behind and try to keep it together and hope that, you know, He will be overconfident and runs out of gas. It has happened in the past a few times, but it seems that now, especially this year,

he has that exercise under control even. You know, he does not run out of energy anymore. He just, he's, he's, there's, listen, there's a reason why. There's a reason why, because this is not a coincidence anymore. If you look at all the last few races, it's always he attacks. He takes one minute and he keeps it there. There's a reason for that. He does not go to his limit.

He gets that minute and then he's capable of managing it. And I mean, yeah, I mean, I wouldn't know they have to try things. I mean, you can you can try a multi-rider attack from other teams. But he's so much stronger than the second best rider. And, you know, it's debatable that the second best rider might actually be on his team. It's del Toro. it's in certain races. So it's not easy to come up with strategies, you know?

Not only that, like we mentioned before, Civikov pulled for 60K. And then as soon as Jay Vine takes his first pull, there's four or five guys left, but he's gone. And that's not even their second best guy. He gets on the front. He starts doing the pace.

And there's four guys left. And Togachar is not even close to his limit. It's just, I don't understand how they're going to beat him in the future. Yeah, I mean, speaking of not being on his limit, George, You know, I think it was telling to see that when Rafael Maika pulled off, there was, you could see there was like 15, 20 guys and everybody else was just hanging on for dear life.

And the fact that Pulachar just took the time to salute Raphael Maika, give him, because it was his last race of his career, you know. On the climb, everybody's suffering. And Pulitzer has the time to think, okay, Rafa, thank you very much. hats off. That's like, okay, you know, we're just waiting for, you know, the Bogacha show to happen. He is just that much better. And also, you know, you can see everybody was at the end.

They were struggling, you know, Remko was, you know, normally Remko, it's, even if he's on the limit, it's hard to see when he's on the limit. You could see when he crested that climb, he was on the limit. But man, also the way he's in control on the downhills and in these corners. it's it's like he you know it's i don't know i don't know i mean listen i i love it but uh it must be super frustrating for themes and rivals um it's like yeah if you get second i think you're it feels like a win i guess well there's always this is my favorite strategy show up and hope pagetra doesn't show up because it's not like it imagine if tatei wins the tour this year and

is like i just want to go hang out on a yacht and i don't want to to do these races at the end of the year. Rimco would have won World Championships time trial, World World Championships Road Race, European Championships Time Trial, European Championships Road Race, and Lombardio. We would be looking at a historical run from Evanapol if Pagos just decided he wanted to do something else.

And I mean, he doesn't go to every race. And he's not always going to be healthy. So I do think Remko can take positives out of this. I did look it up. I think Rimco is riding the best he's ever ridden. He isn't one of the first he's ever ridden. He isn't won a monument in over two years. That's how much the window is narrowing here for riders that can actually compete with Pagachar.

Well, yeah. I think you said he hasn't won a monument in two years, but think about his results after the tour last year. I mean, dominating the Olympic time trial and the road race, riding away from everybody. But like you said, Bogartar wasn't there. Yeah, I love that tactic. It's crazy. But it's the reality of, you know, what we're watching these days. But it's going to happen, you know, I mean, I mean, yeah, I don't think we should even look any further than maybe next year, Spencer, if Pagachar, you know, because I have this, I have this little list here of, if you look at his, I mean, we can go on and on. We can do a whole podcast only talking about unique stats. I know from Pogacar, right? So I have a few things here. So it's, so it's the fifth time he wins Lombardy. Only false to copy has done that in the past, but nobody has done it five times in a row.

He's the, also, Pogaccha is the first rider ever to win both the world championships and Lombardy in the same season, two times in a row. Eddie Merckx has done it once. And I mean, other guys have done it. Like, I mean, I think eight or nine riders were world champion and won Lombardy, but he does it two times in a row. He's the second rider ever to win three monuments in one season. Only Eddie Merckx has done it. Eddie Merckx has done it four seasons. Nobody before.

Nobody before was on the podium of all the monuments in one season. This is Boccacchar. So he's starting to get unique stats. And so if you look at his Palmares, I mean, he's 27 years old. And I have the list here. I go briefly. So he's two times a world champion, European champion. He won the two or four times to the France.

He won the Giro, Tireno, Aliotico twice, Paris, Paris, Catalonia, Dauphine, five times Lombardia, three times Lieres-Baston-Liesch, two times Tour of Flanders, three-Tral-Bianki, two times Flashfalon and Amstel Gold Race. Those are the most important, like, he won a bunch of other races. So I went through, you know, if these guys just want to tick off, you know, they take the boxes. So there's only four events left to win for Pagacar.

It's DeVuelta, Spainia, which, in my opinion, when he shows up, he's going to win it. Might be next year, maybe. Milan Saint-Réman-Parie dupe those two monuments and the Olympic road race there's nothing else to win for Pogacar and he's only 27 so you know I think maybe look I mean let's look at this

I mean I don't know what his calendar going to be but let's suppose he wants to win the Vuelta as soon as possible so let's say next year he does through the France and Vuelta you know maybe he doesn't do the world I mean it's a Montreal well it's a Montreal. But anyway, you can't say, you know, you can't say maybe he's drained and, you know, it doesn't do the world. Double is brutal. Yeah. As we saw with Jonas. Yeah. So we should. So he's, go ahead, George.

Well, I'm saying, I mean, it depends how you look at it. Like the double is not necessarily brutal because you can come out of the world to in really good shape and not even train and be really good at the world. So I know back in our day, that was a great training race. for the world. So obviously guys like Povichard don't need that anymore. And Yonis obviously did not quite recover because he didn't have great performance at the European championships and didn't even go to the world's for that matter. But I think with Pobachar, if he does the world, he'll be fine at. I mean, sorry, if he does the well, he'll be fine at the world next year. Yeah. And I guess Yonis got pummeled at the tour. So that obviously takes it out of you. Whereas we saw last year, Tatei at the Giro, he was always. controlling the pace so he was not depleted when he left that and went into the two of

France. I was just going to say, Johan, said Taday, I don't know if we mentioned this, 10 monument wins in his career, 27 years old, just turned 27, by the way, fresh 27. He only trails Roger de Vlamic, who has 11 monument wins, and Eddie Merck's who has 19. That's a lot. He is two more than the next active writer. That's Matthew Vanderpull, who has eight, which is a ton. The craziest thing about this is these are the ages of their most recent. monument win. Eddie Merck's 30. That's very young to win 19 monuments. Roger DeVlimic, 31, Bagotcher 27, Matthew Vanderpal 30. I mean, that's impressive. That means he is three full years to, he just has to win 2.6 monuments a year for the next three years to match Merck's,

and that's exactly the rate he's been winning at since 2021. That is unbelievable. I think, I think I was thinking about that today when I saw those images. I mean, I saw some images of him training the other day on reconning the course. And then today, you know, on that last climb, I mean, on that last short climb, the crowds were unbelievable. I think ultimately, Bogacha is going to be the one who will make the decision that the dominance is over because we've seen already a little bit of it in the tour at the end. You know, he was a bit overwhelmed by all the attention, the pressure, you know, being solicitated all the time. It must be unbelievably hard. And I don't know if his interview, he said, you know, maybe I don't raise that much longer anymore.

And I think that's the only thing they can hope for for the moment, you know, that Pogachar says, okay, you know what, see you in the duchess. That's it. That's it. That's it for me. Well, you're leaking into question time here. But let's put a pin in that. I do think that's an interesting question. But before we move on, you touched on it, Johan. Well, you said two things. You said, you got to isolate Pagachar.

What we saw today, you can't isolate them because UAE's so strong. What did you guys make of UAE's? I mean, they look like a different team compared to VALTA. They were so well drilled. They knew exactly what they wanted to do. What did you guys think about that? Yeah, there was perfection. I mean, that's what you want to see in a team.

But again, you have the guys like Civikov, Micah, J. Vine. I mean, these are all team leaders in their own right. So it's almost unfair to have these guys set in a tempo at the front and it's like you can't do anything. When these guys are riding tempo, it's like, yeah, what are you going to do attack for one kilometer at 20 more watts and then blow up? It's like you just got to hang on for dear life and then hope Pogachar's attack isn't as strong as it has been the last couple of races. But we saw it as strong or even better. He just keeps getting better and better. Yeah.

And Spencer, I mean, we've talked already about it many times. And it is, once again, we've seen, you know, the UAE is, there's two teams. There's a team when Pogacar is not there and it's UAE with Pogacar. It's completely different. I mean, if you have a guy where, would we say 90% sure is going to win or even more, 95% sure he's going to win because there's no questions, you know, I mean, everybody does their job. And, I mean, the only thing, the only guy we, we didn't. really see today, but because even then, I mean, if you're on such a strong team and you have

your role and you're like, let's say there's Pogacchar, there's Del Toro, and then there's number three, four and five, you know, so if you're number four or number five and you don't have a great day, man, it's, it must be stressful. I'm thinking, for example, about Adam Yates. Adam Yates had a job to do. He couldn't. He couldn't because he was put on the limit by one of his really amazing teammates. Yeah. You know, so being on that team, and George, you know perfectly what I'm talking about when there's a hierarchy in the team and everybody has their job, the moment that when the moment

comes, it's stressful and you have to be there. And sometimes you're not able to. So it's not like, you know, these guys show up and everybody does their job. There's, you know, they need to be ready when it's their time, right? Yeah, I agree. But even when you have such a, Adam Yates, top four or five climbers in the world, you see, he didn't have a great day today. And it was really inconsequential to the team's performance. I mean, they still adapted, kept going, kept going, won the race, no problem.

And Adams, in great form. He just won a race in Italy this week. I mean, so like you said, he just had a bad day. But it really didn't affect the team at all whatsoever. Yeah. Does the sport need a salary cap? I'm just listening to you guys say that. There's no doubt the budget of UAE is affecting the teams and the competition

and the way races are erased this season. I mean, and it's not slowing down. They get whoever they want whenever they want. Yeah. And by the way, it looks to me, I mean, I've been looking at some transfers even with their women's team. They're doing the same thing. they're they're buying away really good riders and good stuff from other teams and the teams

as far as i've been told that it's frustrating because they can't compete you know you know a helper somebody who would be a leader on on on on any team gets paid 50% more to be a helper on you a yeah yeah uh well let did i mean i don't even i don't want to get into the actually I know people that had to change, that lobbied to change the laws to get the NFL salary cap in place. So I don't even know if it could happen, but it would take a lot of legal work to do it. But let's take a quick break. And then I have a, I have a question for you guys, a depressing question about getting old. We'll be right back.

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sleep.com slash the move find the link in the show notes okay so do you guys You mentioned Adam Yates. You mentioned Primo's Roglidge. You didn't mention him. I thought about him. Do you know how many riders over the age of 30 finished in the top 10 of today's race? How many? Zero.

Have we like crossed the Rubicon here? To me, this was the first time, I guess the tour plus this, the first time Primos looked quite his age to me. And Adam Yates, I mean, who was ripping it up just until recently, as we said could not really perform his job today have we reached

a point where it's just tough over 30 to even compete with these guys and then you have a teenager in seventh

Paul Seychas a 21 year old in fifth this is a 240 kilometer race it's like the hardest thing on a body that age

I mean Jay Vine is ninth he might be the oldest guy in the top 10 he's 29 years old I think have we reached

no country for old men status in the world tour I don't know. I think, I mean, in my opinion, the season is so long and so hard. And I do think as you get older, it's many times all about motivation. Like, is a guy like Primos, you know, he's won pretty much everything he's done except for the tour. You know, has just finished the world.

I mean, perhaps he's just not motivated to get to that next extra level. Like him getting a result of podium today in Lombardier, not affect his career whatsoever so in my opinion is not a question of his fitness form it's a question of how deep we are into the season and a lack of perhaps motivation yeah it does it does get more difficult with age you know and especially at the end of the season uh to stay stay motivated it's not just for the race it's the way you prepare the race how hungry you are to still train you know that's i mean the two weeks before lombardy uh although they have done a few races but they still need to train and if you do your trainings just what you have to do because that's what

the plan says or if you do it with hunger and motivation and you know really with inspiration it's going to make a difference the way you show up at the race that's why it's so shocking i mean obviously poachar has no problem with motivation but like he's been winning since his first race of the year and to keep winning to the end race of the year. It's something we haven't really witnessed in cycling. Well, that, yeah, it's a good, it's a good point. I mean, Larry and the members chat, I will get to all these questions, but Larry's just popped one up. He said, how much of Pagatra winning ways are a result of his genetic makeup? I would guess a lot, but the thing that surprises me most about Pagachar is he's truly a cannibal. Like, he was going at it at the UAE

tour in what February? And now he's going. just as hard in October. Like, does this guy, he doesn't seem to have an off switch. It's unbelievable. Yeah. He's up there all the time. I mean, they, obviously, they do race less. You know, Bogachar just, he just races the races he wants to win.

He doesn't do any races. Nowadays, they don't do any more races to prepare. That's done. They train a lot harder and more specific for their goal. then being stuck in whatever, say Tour of Mercia and you just have to ride there for three, four days and you know, you're sitting in the Peloton and you're in zone two, not doing any work. Those times are over. They train a lot harder than back in the days, George. You guys were sometimes using certain stage races to prepare.

But that's just not, I mean, you get worse sometimes if you go to a. all stage race than what you would accomplish with specific training yeah i agree now they're they're doing their efforts they're they're fueling themselves everything is completely dialed in planned out um yeah like yohan said they're not doing these week long stage races for training anymore he's just doing it to win races and he does the ones that he wants to win yeah someone said to me like well how he looks so fresh he's been racing three times this week and say i would gander that his training is harder than these races, these midweek races at least. If he's not racing, he's training incredibly hard, harder than we can.

Yeah, well, I mean, Spencer, now at the end of the season, probably, you know, listen, he's, he came into great shape again after Montreal. I mean, we saw a little, a little, you know, adaptation for the, for the World Championships Time Trial, but since he won the Worlds, you can keep that. I mean, he doesn't need to train that much, you know, he did the worlds, he did the European championships. He did Trevali the other day. So it's not that. I mean, it's, I think it's the going to race is full gas and then just coffee rights in my opinion. There's not much else. And then he did this recon of Lombardine. He did he took his KOM on the climb where he attacked

today. So not much more to do. It's a good point. I mean, I was thinking about that in the In respect to, I would rather be doing what Pagotra is doing than assume you'd have to be training. If you're Jonas Vindigard and you're at home, are you training right now or are you in your off-season? How are you managing that? I would say he's in an off-season. I mean, he just did the European championships a week ago. Obviously, he didn't do a great result, but he deserves some. They all deserve some sort of time off the bike.

So I'm guessing he's probably off the bike right now. He's got that big crit coming up next weekend, though. Yohan. Well, to answer Larry's question, I would guess a lot. Like Jonas Critor, our friend at a stat, that in the last 18 one-day races, Bagachar's 1-17 were one solo. I mean, there's training. He's clearly very good at training.

Everything's dialed in. He's gotten better since they seem to have switched something behind the scenes two years ago or a year and a half ago. And that's things have clicked for him. but I would imagine just physically it's like this in any sport why did I think Messi had as many free kit goals as the rest of

the league he was in for like a multi-year period some people are just genetically better than other people but he's definitely he's definitely you know we've we've talked about it many times he's a huge talent you know he was he was extremely good very young

and we talked about it yesterday Spencer on the show on outcomes you know to consider that he won the two times the Tour de France, his first and second, when he was not really fine-tuned yet. He was not super professional yet. You know, we talked about the physical transformation since, you know, his first time he showed up at Al Garvey and won three stages in the Volta.

And look at him now. It's funny to talk about the transformation. He might have been the strongest rider in that Volta. that he was like chubby maybe because he was I mean it was Roglidge wanted him over there was second I think and he was third and he was flying in that third week yeah yeah yeah yeah so you know I mean if you look at what he accomplished already without being super professional and we know that's true now he's you know he has the best people around him best trainers best

nutritionists, best, you know, aerodynamics people. Because that's also obviously a big advantage if you're on a huge team, huge budget team that they hired the best people from all over the world that are available. So it's, it's, I think it's, in my opinion, it's, it must be a very peaceful feeling for a guy like Pogacar that he knows that all the people around him are the best in the market. You get on your bike and, you know, he's saying, okay, you know, I know I'm good. Everything else is, you know, the best. So let's go.

It's been a long process. It wasn't always like that. No. I also feel like we should mention the man is basically on a time trial bike. Like you talked about holding these gaps. That has to help. I mean, that bike is incredibly air out that he's on. Yeah, it is.

They're also, you know, UAE, but also, for example, Colnago, they came a long way. you know i mean when conago started with uae from what i heard the bikes were not that good um i mean you can see in that picture you posted yesterday yeah it's a pretty simple bike yeah and now now it's top top top of the top of top of the game so just to get into our in game here you mentioned in the pre-show pagacar has four things left to win to match eddie merks well to spagna that will be won. Olympics, that will probably be won. Eddie Merck's never won the Olympics, by the way. Oh, to surpass.

Wait, you know the funny story about Eddie Merck's and the Olympics? So anyway, he only went once because it was not open to professionals back then, right? So the funny story about the Olympics in the Merck's family is that so Eddie never got an Olympic title or medal. Or metal. Axel got bronze, his son who got bronze in Athens. in, I think 2000, was it

2004? He was Beijing, so 2004, 2004. It was Bettini, Paolino and Axelmerks.

And so his grandson, Luca, Luca Masso, who is the son of Sabrina, Eddie's daughter, was a hockey player, like hockey,

not ice hockey, hockey, like field hockey. Yeah. And, And that's actually a really funny story. I don't know if you know that story, George. So his dad was an ex-is, is an Argentinian ex-teness player, Eduardo Masso.

So he had double nationality. And Luca Masso was playing in Belgium competition for the Belgian team. And he was not selected for the national team for the Olympic Games. And so he applied for a spot on the Argentinian team. for the Olympics. He got selected for Argentina, did the Olympics, and the final of the Olympic Games hockey was Argentina, Belgium.

And Argentina won. So Luca Maso is an Olympic champion. I didn't know that. That's pretty wild. That's Eddie's grandson. Pencil Pagaturan for the Olympics. And then we get to the two tough ones. Milan San Remo, Peri, Rube.

Let's just as a peri ruby, we can see a path. He was close this year. And my opinion, San Remo is the toughest. And right on cue, Raul in the chat, asks, what does Tadai need to do to win Milan San Remo? What would your answer be there? This seems to be the hardest one remaining in his path. And that also speaks to the motivation you talked about.

Like, what's keeping him motivated? I guarantee you it's these races he's not won. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Yeah, and he lives right down the road from San Remo as well. I mean, these guys all know that climb like the back of their hand. He's been close. It's just similar tactics to what we've seen,

although San Remo, the climbs aren't quite as steep. So guys like Vanderpull, then art, they can usually hang on to him when he goes. I think an all-out assault from his team already on the suppressa, favorable wins for a hard pace, not a headwind, obviously, a tailwind. It'll make the climb even harder. Yeah, I think, and they've got to, I think we'll probably,

If he does, in fact, want to win to San Remo, we will see that type of tactic next year. Yeah, I think, I think I agree, George. You know, they need to have a harder race on the Chippresa. And in my opinion, he needs to be able to get away on the Chupressa because on the Poggio, it's difficult. I mean, especially, I mean, especially Van der Poul, he has that. I mean, and of course, you know, they don't always show up in the same shape every season, right? If you're just one or two percent off, it may be enough, right? I mean, at some point I thought, you know,

he almost had Vanderpul on the Podgio this year, but then Vanderpull attacked on the top. So I think Milan San Remo is going to be the most difficult, honestly, to win for Pogacar because, yeah, I mean, the thing is also, I mean, I mean, maybe another scenario could be have a teammate in the break and try to go alone on the Cipresa and have somebody in between the Cipresa

and the Poggio, but no team will let that happen. If there's a UAE rider in the break, they're not going to let that break go, other teams. Kilometer zero attack. But it's like, George, it's like, I fed you this answer. This is exactly what I wanted you to say.

You saw him today. They go into the Pasadaganda, and he's doing traffic control with his team. Del Toro is not where he needs to be. And that's been a problem. At San Remo, I believe, the last two years where, especially two years ago, the team was not positioned correctly going into Trapressa. He didn't have the team to set the hard pace.

I almost think, it sounds ridiculous. He's in Lombardia thinking about drilling the team for San Remo. I guarantee he's incredibly motivated to win that. And they did the playbook today. They just need to do it. The precision at San Remo has to be. It's so much higher. The bar is so much higher because the pace is faster.

everything's tougher and it brings us to this funny thing where these hard races are are essentially non-contests anymore and the only thing interesting in cycling anymore are the easier races like san remo which used to be considered the most boring races now in my opinion the most exciting race because anything could happen yeah i mean just just what you just said spencer is what it's easier said than done i mean the position for the suppressa and milan ramo is one of the hardest most stressful position in games in all of cycling because it's not that hard to get there. So everybody gets there fresh. You have full team leadouts, windy roads, very easy to sit on the wheel, although, of course,

the distance starts to play a big role. But I mean, no matter how strong UAE is, when they're battling out with these hardcore classics guys, it's still a very tough task to get the whole team together at the bottom of suppressa. Wouldn't you agree on? Yeah, yeah, for sure, for sure. I think that's why I say, I think Milan San Remo is the most difficult because it's a very tough. It is so accessible for the majority of the teams and riders to get in a decent position to the Chippresa. Today, for example, it's not even an issue because after 200K, everybody's dead and they have 4,000 meters already in the legs.

And that's not the case in Milan-San Remo. I think that's going to be the most difficult one. But he's been close a few times already. it'll take maybe a yeah an off day of one of the other guys you know and

Wanderpool Walt Ghana was there this year also yeah I mean the problems are going terminal velocity up the pogeo so I don't think they can go

any faster so they got to move that attack further out yeah yeah well I mean two years ago Phillips had won So, I mean, it's never a decisive. That's the difference with all the other races. So, I mean, also Ramo, even if, even if Pagacca gets away by himself or with two other guys, there's, it's never going to be a minute or, you know, not even 30 seconds.

It's the other guys are always there and there's always that possibility that they can make it back. It happened two years ago when Yaspir-Pillipson won. Yeah. And, yeah, I mean, I think San Ramo's the best race of the year because of that. the a few questions for you like where do we go from here what's the future like just forgot you just keep winning in perpetuity i assume no and then how does it end and who wins it you want to go first george yeah i mean what we're seeing these young people you know rising up del torro sex sauce um they're still 21 19 years old 21 years old i mean you got to think they're

going to keep getting better and better. Bogachar now is on the upper at levels of the 20s, which back in our day was still super young, but I mean, you think it'd be hard to imagine him to continue to improve.

But you can see these younger guys improving because they're still super young and have several ways of improvement. But, I mean, that's the only thing I can say because right now, this current form has just been unbeatable. Yeah, but I think the guy who ends it is Pogacar himself.

Yeah. It's when he's going to lose motivation and be burned out. And I can see that because, man, you know, like, we saw the, we saw the images on the, was it in the, it was in the European, European champions now where people were matching him and putting stickers on his back. And today also, you know, on that climb, that actually gets to you. I've seen a few big champions that, you know, physically they were still able to do it, but there's only so much your motivation and your patience and your dedication can take.

And it wears out after a while. How did, yeah, I was thinking about that point, Johan. How did Merck's domination in it? He got punched in the kidney and then he lost that tour. And then what happened after that? I think he won it one more time. so yeah so that's what i was i do think what will happen is pagachar will lose and then you enter this second second phase it's almost like the fires reignited because someone will come up whether

it's paul se shas isaq al toro and beat him and then you're fighting so much for like that last win like usually you don't come back and win a bunch but that's what's so impressive he lost two already and come came back and won multiple ones after that that's almost unheard of but i do think will get beat and then and then it either is go away forever or he has to come back and try to win another one but he's not nearly as dominant kind of like I think Eddie Merck's from what I mean I'm not 100% sure but I think Eddie Merck didn't win any grant tour anymore after 30 um I think his last one he was 29 or 30 um and because I think he won his first four and then he lost one and then he won another one and then he didn't win anymore i think if i'm not mistaken

yeah i'm even thinking of like contador you know dominant and then another generation comes up oh it room showed up with contola was frum showed up and that was it but even remember there was the giro where he's getting dropped by landa and fabio arru and he had to fight his way up the finestra and wins his last year to tell you i do think we have that phase from bagachar it's hard to imagine now, but I think he will not be this dominant forever. No, no, of course not. Of course not. But, you know, again, I said it yesterday. And George, I don't know, you'll probably agree with me. You know, since I have been actively in cycling, since I started racing myself and then through all the years, because, you know, I have a vague memory of Marx. But there's never

been anybody so dominant on all levels, Estelle Pogacchar, in the last 50 years, I would say. So, you know, if you think about Frum and Contador and, you know, they were never so dominant. I mean, they were there, but they also lost sometimes. They didn't always win. This guy just always wins. Well, they would rarely win one-day races. I don't even know if they ever won major one-day races. I can think of. No, they didn't. two more questions first this one i don't even like this question but i'm going to ask it is this is this good for cycling this dominance i don't i mean i think it's maybe it gets a little bit boring after a while because you kind of know exactly what's going to happen um but

the same time you know you have a once and a hundred year rider that we're able to witness you know greatness um so in that sense it's pretty pretty cool to to witness as well i think i think it's great if the best guy wins and even if he wins all the if he's the best and he wins i mean it's i think it's great for the sport uh especially i mean what's even more what's even more impressive with with polacha is that cycling is probably one of the most unpredictable sports i mean you lose a lot more than you win uh you know it's not like in any other sport if you're the best okay you win track and field you're the best you win most of the times you're right but cycling is you lose a lot more

and and this guy just always wins so um i i i i like it i like it i'm i mean i'm a i'm a polacha fan for sure yeah it's like a type you know people forget what it's you're in the middle of that like tiger woods is most impressive run you same bowl you know there's these once-in-century athletes and you just have to enjoy it because it will be over you forget also here's my my mini take on this is we we have seen three major races that suit him perfectly so like world championships european championships lombardia it will like next season will roll around and he's got to go he's got to go play in the mud in the classics and people will overrate his dominance they'll forget that vanderpull beat him multiple times last year and there'll probably be a betting opportunity

to bet on someone like vanderpull or someone who's going to beat him and he'll look human again It's just been, it's been a funny end of the season where you had the tour and then all these races have been ultra hard. So, of course, he looks dominant. I think we're seeing he's very good, obviously. He's the best, I think, ever. But you've seen the field has been slanted in his favor and it won't always be this way. Last question before we go. Also, I just want to give shoutouts to Lombardy.

Looked amazing, by the way. Man, want to go to Bergamo. Also, we should say, Tudor getting on the podium. Quinn Simmons. I think we already shouted him out. That was super impressive. Paul Seychas, 19, getting seventh. Isaac Altoro, you're amazing.

Kind of Oudabrox, getting 10th. Good result. Yeah, great result. But last question before we go. Also, this race is, people are going to complain about it, but the leaves are turning. It just looks nice on TV. It's not too intense. You kind of sit there, you watch it.

It'd be a great way to end the season. But David Brown asked us the other day, and he put it again in the chat. Is this season with three, Monument wins, only one grand tour win, the Tour of France, world championship win, is it more impressive than last season where he won two grand tours, but only two monuments, I believe, unless I have that wrong. Only two monuments last year. I think he even said in his interview, it was the best season ever, but yeah, I would say

even more impressive than last year. I think so. I think his level this year is higher. his dominance was unbelievable I mean only one grand tour because he only did one spencer you know it's you know he did all five monuments was on all the monuments on the podium plus a bunch of other races that there was no raising really no room for him for for a second round tour I mean right there that has that ever been done before all monuments on the podium No, no, no, no.

I said it before. It's never been done. Never. That is, I mean, that is, that just sunk in for me. It's unbelievable. It's crazy. Wow. Wow. That's crazy.

This whole podcast could be us just saying, wow, that's crazy. Never seen that before. Yeah. And then if you guys had to pick the next big star of the sport, just from the last few races, who are you going to pick? I say, Deltoro. Yeah. I agree. Amazing.

Yeah, del Toro. You know, it's also, he can, he's a stage racer can win a ground tour. He almost won the Giro. And he wins one day races. I don't see him do what Bogachard. I mean, I, a guy like Del Toro, for example, I don't see him in Roubaix and Flanders. I think it's a different type of rider. Although he's, but did we see when Pagatja was that age? I don't think we saw him. Yeah, no, right? No, but, but, but, but, but, but, but, but, but, but, but, but. So anyway, I think we're witnessing something unique with Pogacar and we're already starting. I mean, listen, we said before, you know, we're not going to compare riders with each other. I mean, you could compare Del Toto with Pogacca because they're from the same era. But I don't think it's comparable. You know, there's nobody who can be compared right now with Pogacar off of the day cycling. Do you agree, George? no yeah I mean not that I can remember

the crazy thing about del Toro's season is he almost won the Giro to tell you and it's easy to forget you know like even if you take that Giro out of the picture he still had one of the best seasons he won 15 races Spencer 15 races that's crazy and and polacha what the day was his 20th win of the season 20th right yeah got him up to 40% win rate for the season 50 starts 20 wins unbelievable You see, that's, that's crazy.

That is crazy. And that includes the stages in the stage races. So just imagine how many stages there are, like, for them in the tour that he's actually not even going for it. So that's already out of the window. Wow. And 40% he wins. Wow.

That's crazy. It's crazy. I mean, it does help that, man, there's not many races outside the Tour de France city didn't win. So that does help your numbers quite a bit. Well, it does. I mean, there's stages he didn't win in stage races. A few. A few. There's what he, he didn't win four stages of the bunch of the bunch of friends. Yeah. I mean, think of all the breakaway days at the tour. It was like the whole

last half of the race. I mean, that's crazy. All right. Anything else, guys, before we take off? Yeah, I think that's it. No. Thanks for joining. And we'll be back on Friday for our Q&A. And then tour to France Root Reveal with another special guest on October 23rd. Okay, thanks. Thanks, guys. Bye, Joe.