Pogacar enjoyed the fans, but not the pace set by Visma | Lease a Bike: "It was super tough"

Tadej Pogacar once again secured a commanding victory in the Tour of Catalonia. The Slovenian from UAE Team Emirates decided to break away on the penultimate climb, and nobody saw him again. He left his closest rivals far behind, and the rest is history. Pogacar now holds an unusually large lead over the rest of the podium for a seven-day stage race. Afterward, he appeared tired but satisfied in the flash interview.

"This was another very tough stage," he began somewhat dutifully. "Our team controlled the race well from the start. However, on the hors catégorie climb, Visma | Lease a Bike set a pace that really wasn't fun. It was super, super tough! Then there were only about ten of us left. Luckily, I still had Marc Soler and Joao Almeida with me. We tried to maintain a pace until the start of the penultimate climb, and then everyone caught up."

Pogacar took it easy and enjoyed the fans: "But I was really suffering"

Surprisingly, even Pogacar found the pace set by Visma painful, but no further moves were made. Sepp Kuss and Cian Uijtdebroeks couldn't keep up, so the initiative was back with Pogacar and his team. "Movistar then tried to attack, but I just went over them. I even told the others: let's stick together to the top. The rest is just history," he hinted at the fact that ultimately no one could keep up with him. After that, Pogacar seemed to ride calmly to the finish. "I carefully descended. But I was suffering, you know, I really enjoyed the fans on the last climb." Tomorrow we'll see if Pogacar also wants to make a move in the final stage in Barcelona.