Better, stronger and above all smarter: Tadej Pogacar shows his pure class and is almost back on the Tour throne

The cycling world got a Pyrenean weekend to feast on. Okay, perhaps the icing on the cake would have been if Jonas Vingegaard had been able to keep up with Tadej Pogacar. Then, with another leaden week ahead, there would have been more excitement in the 2024 Tour de France. But the level, the sheer excellence of cycling that we have seen over the past two days has never been seen before. Pla d'Adet and Plateau de Beille will go down in the books as the monster duo, the two cols of the outer category that took professional cycling to a new level. That is rightfully the conclusion of the Pyrenees diptych.

Rarely has the southernmost of France's great two mountain ranges produced such a battlefield as in this edition. Pogacar is now a good three minutes ahead ofVingegaard, largely cycled together on the aforementioned uphill arrivals.The Dane had hoped on these cols to bolster his Tour aspirations. And he succeeded. Vingegaard rarely rode as well uphill as he did last weekend. But Pogacarhas learned from recent years. Has grown tactically. Dares to gamble and especially knows when to strike. Order has been restored. Pogacar shows in thisTour that he is simply the better rider compared to Vingegaard and is even stronger than in 2020 and 2021, during his first two Tour victories;

Record on Plateaude Beille shows extraterrestrial Pogacar in most striking way

Back to ride fifteen. Plateau de Beille. A leaden and leaden col, one of the toughest uphill arrivals in the history of the Tour de France. Pogacar was tight on his eternal rival's wheel from the foot. He stayed there for kilometers, looking around, calmly thinking about the moment to leave himself. Conclusion: he could go even faster than Vingegaard. The numbers say it all. Both Vingegaard and Pogacar rode minutes off the fastest times ever realized on this alien mountain. Sixteen kilometers at eight percent, tested at an average of 24 per hour. That's crazy. Three and a half minutes faster than the fastest time ever run on the Beille. Almost 10% stronger than the lateMarco Pantani. Those are the bizarre, shocking new standards of Pogacar,with an almost equally impressive Vingegaard in his shadow.

For one might have expected otherwise. In Vingegaard's field, Pogacar has struck.That's what you hear most voices from the peloton saying then. If that is really so, that is the biggest gain for the Slovenian compared to recent years. His stage victory was a copy-paste of the way Vingegaard beat him on Hautacam, two years ago.A similar col that was thought to be more suited to the Dane. But not in 2024. Not in reality. Because more and more signs indicate that if Pogacar provides the same tactical ability and makes the smartest decisions at the right moments, Vingegaard will not be the better one vis-a-vis the yellow jersey wearer even on the longer cols.

Final wins Vingegaardin 2022 and 2023 show how cleverly Jumbo-Visma put the puzzle together in those years

That puts Pogacar'sTour victories in 2020 and 2021 as well as Vingegaard's final victories in the last two years in a different light. Pogi won his first twoTours without a real team. He won his big one in 2021 without any real competition. No one saw that there would be a cure for his dominance in the following years. All the more impressive is the fact that Jumbo-Visma still twice devised a successful master plan to trounce Pogacar. In 2022 there was thenumerical outnumber in the Granon stage, and in 2023 there was the good fortune that Pogacar collapsed in week three, as well as the near-perfect preparation for theclimb time trial, where the decisive gap was created. In retrospect, these were also defeats that forced the Slovenian to change his approach, which now seems to be succeeding. His team UAE was also tactically unsophisticated in previous years, where this year there is more sensible racing.

The energy with which Pogacar flung in the first phase of the 2022 Tour was startling.Stage wins in hill stages, firm sprints that did not yield seconds andold-three chases on the Galibier, including on Primoz Roglic, who already made a paralyzed impression in thatTour. In 2023, the two-time overall winner simply suffered from an empty tank at the end. Pogacar's season build-up in 2024 provides him with a form peak after the Giro even in the Tour. And even during the current Tour, the yellow jersey is learning. The attack to Le Lioran came too early. Whether it was due to a sugar deficiency or not, the attack was from too far. Five kilometers before the finish he went, both Saturday and Sunday in the Pyrenees. Just good enough to grab about a minute twice. Whichever way you look at it, these are steps Pogacar had not taken in race fitness over the past two years.

What's left for Visma | Lease a Bike in the 2024 Tour after an unprecedented year of bad luck

Pogacar is stronger, all-around better and, above all, smarter than the competition in this Tour. The orderly, in short, recovered. He is as victorious as he was during his first two triumphant tours. He is riding around again with the charisma of the branieschopper of yore. The only other thing that is also different from the past two years is the weakening of the major competitor. Vingegaard may miraculously be pedaling his best ever, but Visma | Lease a Bike lacks a sharpened Sepp Kuss and aWout van Aert in top form, who were there the past two editions. The troubled team made a brave and magnificent attempt to break the UAE armor, but fell short of really hurting the big boss himself. The contrast with the past two seasons is just too great for that.

That leaves only one stage for the titleholders to force a change. The final week is going to be hot and the nineteenth stage is going to be high. Two more aspects of which one thinks Vingegaard hypothetically, perhaps, has an advantage over Pogacar. The Col de la Bonette, with its 2800 meter altitude, should then become the site of a very last attempt to crack the yellow jersey. But then again, what do you do when the opponent is simply better, stronger and nowadays smarter? As much as we would like to see a duel to the streets of Nice, order has been restored for now. Tadej Pogacar has almost regained his Tour throne.