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Tadej Pogacar, quiet prodigy of the Tour de France

“Tadej can put on ten Nutella pancakes on the morning of the Mediterranean Games [de 2018] before we put misery on the bike. He can stop peeing 5 kilometers from the last pass of the last stage of the Tour de l’Avenir and defend his yellow jersey. He only does what he wants. And when his head wants something, his legs bend over it. “ The Slovenian Tadej Pogacar, who will turn 22 at the end of the Tour, is the splashing revelation.

“Will”

He won Sunday in the Pyrenean stage Pau-Laruns, beating his compatriot Primoz Roglic in the sprint, who took the yellow jersey. It was he who had shredded the group of favorites by an assault on the slopes of the Col de Marie-Blanque 20 kilometers from the finish. He who, Saturday, took 40 seconds in advance in the rise of Peyresourde, a feat that no favorite has been able to establish in recent years in a single offensive, in a post-EPO cycling that has narrowed the gaps. His childhood friend Jaka Primozic is clear about the runner currently ranked seventh, 44 seconds behind Roglic: it would all be a matter of “will”. “He eats what he wants, sleeps when he wants, gets up to train when he wants. It’s because he has the motor to move forward on the bike, he adds. It is not arrogance. Tadej is a very simple guy, quite phlegmatic, with a great state of mind. His life is Netflix and cycling. A normal guy. Almost normal. ” Primozic lost sight of his comrade in 2019 when he joined Team UAE-Emirates and moved to Monaco.

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Instead of discovering his profession in careful stages, Pogacar burns them all: victory in the Tour of California, third place in the Tour of Spain with three successes on stages. The old boyfriend feels compelled to point out: “It is true that Tadej does not waste time.” Another sidekick, Nik Cemazar, praises a character “Very calm and very funny”. He thinks this supremacy arose out of a lack. When he started competing at age 9, Tadej Pogacar would have sought to compensate for several deficits. “You would have seen him in the peloton, he didn’t look like much!” his young colleague has fun. His parents are far from the contingencies of sport, his mother a French teacher in Komenda, near the capital, Ljubljana, and his father an industrial designer in a furniture factory. His big brother is the first to ride. Tadej follows him on a small green bicycle. Lilliputien among the crowd of other runners. Friends call her “Tamau Pogi”, kind of elf in Slovenian.

“Sharp”

“He never let go, but he must have been very smart for that, continues Cemazar. His small size sharpened his intelligence. Today the heart and lungs have grown. The addition of a solid body and great intelligence in the race, it gives what we see on this Tour de France! ” The friends do not miss any television broadcasts. “He unfortunately lost 1’20” by puncturing on Friday’s stage when the peloton was bordering [éclatait sous l’effet du vent, ndlr]. But it can still surprise us ”, Primozic hopes. And Cemazar to observe: “The Slovenian fans are cheering on Roglic. This is normal, he is older, more famous and he has obtained the best results so far. But I think that soon the fans will love ‘Pogi’. ”

Pierre Carrey special correspondent on the Tour de France

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