(La Nucía) Tadej Pogacar announced on Monday that he will aim for the double at the Tour of Italy and the Tour de France in 2024, a feat that has not been achieved since Marco Pantani in 1998.
The 25-year-old Slovenian rider confirmed that he would compete in the two Grand Tours and would therefore take the start of the Giro (4-26 May) for the first time in his career during a press conference in La Nucia, south-west. is from Spain, where his UAE team is in training to prepare for the upcoming season.
On Sunday, the organizers of the Tour of Italy published a video in which Pogacar, winner of the Tour de France in 2020 and 2021, announced his arrival by simply releasing Andiamo (literally, here we go).
“It’s always been a dream to race the Giro, it’s one of my favorite races, close to Slovenia. I’m older now, I think I’ll be able to handle two Grand Tours, I’m ready for a new challenge,” he said.
Aiming for victory in the same year in the Giro and the Tour de France (June 29-July 21, 2024) has become rare for the best riders in the peloton, so demanding is the sequence of these two three-week races for the organizations.
That Pogacar, known for his insatiable appetite, chose 2024 to attempt the double is a challenge all the greater since the Slovenian intends to interfere in the fight for the gold medal at the Paris Olympic Games on August 4 and that he is also eyeing the Worlds in Zurich on September 29.
But “Pogi”, who should start his season at the Strade Bianche on March 2, has never hidden his desire to discover the Tour of Italy, he who likes to shine on all terrains, whether the great classics or the races in stages, and play for victory all year round, from February to October.
There was no question of missing the Tour de France, the most important race of the year in the eyes of the riders, but also of the sponsors and the economic partners of his team.
The Slovenian will have revenge to take on the Grande Boucle, which will start from Florence in Italy, after finishing second in the last two editions, each time behind the Dane Jonas Vingegaard.
For this, the UAE team will build a real “ dream team » by announcing on Monday that she intended to line up big names like Adam Yates, Juan Ayuso, Joao Almeida, Pavel Sivakov as lieutenants.
Tadej Pogacar does not believe in mechanical doping
Tadej Pogacar said on Monday that he did not believe in the existence of mechanical doping in professional cycling, judging that it was “not possible to hide” an engine in the bike without it being discovered.
“Since (general public) electric bikes have become fashionable, we have seen that it is not so easy to put a motor in a bike. I think we would see it. I don’t think it’s possible to hide it,” said the double winner of the Tour de France (2020 and 2021) during a press conference dedicated to his 2024 season in La Nucia, southeast of the Spain.
“There were rumors five, ten years ago. But I don’t even remember the last time I heard about it. I think we can be calm about that today,” added the leader of the UAE team.
Despite suspicions around ten years ago, no proven case of mechanical doping has ever been detected in a professional road cycling race.
The only proven case of a bike aided by a hidden engine dates back to January 2016 at the U21 Cyclo-cross World Championships. It earned Belgian Femke Van den Driessche, 19, a six-year suspension by the UCI.
During the last Tour de France, the International Cycling Union (UCI) said it had carried out, as part of its program to combat technological fraud, 997 checks on all 21 stages which all turned out to be negative.
France Media Agency
