Another Scintillating Strade Bianche Showing by Tadej Pogačar

Tadej Pogačar got his year off to a dazzling start on Saturday, capturing his fourth victory in Strade Bianche with a solo move 80km from the finish.

The world champion pushed clear on the Monte Sante Marie sector and while Tom Pidcock initially held his wheel on that downhill section, the Pinarello Q36.5 Pro Cycling rider experienced a dropped chain and slipped back.

Pogačar (UAE Emirates-XRG) persisted and fended off all efforts to close him down again, hammering the pedals around and finishing well clear in Sienna.

Teammate Isaac Del Toro and Paul Seixas (Decathlon CMA CGM Team) were the next best and leaped clear of the chasers with 17km to go. Seixas did all the chasing but couldn’t make any impression on Pogačar’s lead, with the multiple winner smiling at the cameras en route to a record fourth victory.

“Probably I always say this but chapeau to the teammates today. Everybody did an incredible job,” Pogačar said. “It was just beautiful to see all the guys in the team performing so well. It was an honor to ride with such a team today and to deliver the win. I am super happy.”

Seixas was clearly the second strongest rider in the race, briefly bridging to Pogačar after he got his gap but then blowing up right away. He did all the chasing with Del Toro on his wheel and, despite that energy expended, still blew the Mexican away on the final climb of Via Santa Caterina.

He finished exactly one minute behind Pogačar, with Del Toro at 1:09.

“I saw that he was chasing really hard on the steepest part of the climb, on Sante Maria,” Pogačar said of 19 year old Seixas. “I said to myself ‘I will go all out to the top and then I will see if he can bridge. Either he will come to my wheel or he will make a gap.’

“In the end I saw it was enough. I knew that Isaac was there and Jan also, so this helped a lot to go alone.”

More to follow soon…