The discovery of the Tour route is also of interest to the Giro.

To understand if Remco Evenepoel 's rainbow jersey will take one way or another. Or maybe both, in Italy to prepare for the debut in France.

This morning the team talks about a Tour for Tadej Pogacar . It does not mention the Belgian. Mmm. There will be what they call a mini-Liège-Bastogne-Liège in the Vosges, six steps in 133 kilometers, including the Petit Ballon and Platzerwasel sequence, on the penultimate stage, on the eve of the Champs-Élysées.

For the second consecutive year, Tadej Pogacar took advantage of the presentation of the Tour route in Paris to go to the editorial office of the sports newspaper the day before. This time without the classic interview, but to answer the questions of ten “carefully selected” subscribers, says the newspaper among the thousands of questions presented to the communications office, “a record for a meeting with readers”.

They discarded us.

Instead there were an electronic engineer, a business manager, a project manager whatever it is, a contact center assistant director, an IT specialist, a trader, a student, a chocolatier, a middle school teacher and an entrepreneur. .

"The originality of the profiles of the interlocutors - says the team - generated two or three unexpected responses, for example we learned that the heartbeat of the Slovenian phenomenon is extraordinarily slow, recently measured at 38 beats, and that this year it has beaten his power records, 500 watts generated during the ten-minute ascent of the Côte de la Croix. But subscribers have asked Pogacar quite classic questions ”.

Thank god.

And he: «I started pedaling to do like my brother Tilen , who is two years older than me. The first results did not arrive immediately, far from it. I won my first race in the second year, an uphill finish. I had no idols as a boy: I saw Alberto Contador, Andy Schleck , their duel on the Tour was fun, but I didn't watch many races on TV. I really didn't have any youth heroes. I think I feel the tension like everyone else. I feel an adrenaline rush before every climb, of a big step, I am taken by stress as each sprint approaches. But I try to take everything in a relaxed way. I do not follow any specific mental training, I do not see psychologists, it is my nature and I am happy about it.

I love my sport and I try to take beauty even on bad days. I didn't win the yellow jersey but I had a fantastic year . I won almost everything I wanted, in terms of intensity it was probably the most difficult season I have had to face. I rested well after the Tour. This second place is like a victory. I learned a lot.

I felt more love from the audience than after my two wins. I will return to Flanders The duel against Mathieu van der Poel will remain one of the highlights of my season. I was a rookie in that race, I had no idea what to expect. I was very angry at first for losing, I quickly forgot about it. The Roubaix is not a suitable race for my profile, I should put on a few pounds. For fun I would go there, why not, but at the end of my career.

The rainbow jersey is one of my big dreams . Being world champion is the best, just like a victory in the Tour and even more than the Olympic title. I want to win it in the next five years. After that, I'll be too old. There are no Fab Four in cycling like in tennis. With us there are too many great races, four riders are not enough to divide all the great titles. To say that there are four cyclists above all the others is an understatement ».

Photo Sprint Cycling

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