"We were worried about him physically": Wellens lifts lid on Pogacar’s scare and UAE’s dominance

Tadej Pogacar’s fourth Tour de France title almost never happened. The Slovenian admitted he briefly considered stepping off the bike, a scare that teammate Tim Wellens now details. Complete with knee pain, a hospital visit, and a deliberately conservative final week.

Pogacar pinpointed the turning point as the day after the finish on Mont Ventoux. "The day after the stage that finished on Mont Ventoux, my knee started to bother me and I began to doubt whether I could continue at all. And then there was the stage to La Plagne… on top of that the weather was extremely bad, it was cold and my body went into survival mode.”

“I was retaining fluid because my body was in shock," he added. "I’d had enough; I really didn’t feel at my best, but I think every rider who’s ever done a Grand Tour knows that three weeks is no small thing.” By now we know the Slovenian finished (and won) the Tour de France, albeit with a notably conservative third week.

Wellens told l’Équipe the tension peaked in stage 17 to Valence: “In the stage to Valence he said to me: ‘Tim, we have a problem, my knee hurts.’ It was so bad he walked to the doctor’s car to be examined. After the stage, he went to the hospital."

"They found an inflammation or something like that, and nobody knew!" The Belgian feared the worst. "He was in a lot of paid and we doubted he’d make it to the finish. We even considered stopping. On the team bus, we could see he wasn’t doing well," he adds.

Ultimately, Pogacar reached Paris and sealed yellow, though UAE’s restraint in the final mountains raised eyebrows. “It was a relief that he didn’t give up in the mountains. Everyone wondered why he wasn’t attacking, which is understandable… Afterwards we worried about him physically, but mentally I was surprised to read he wanted to go home, because we actually had a great time together.”

And so Pogi claimed his fourth Tour de France, in a year when he won virtually everything there was to win. That kind of dominance can stir some hostility among fans, Wellens notes. “If I wasn’t on his team, maybe I’d be tired of him too… But I’m with him and I see all the work he does. For me, he and Juan Ayuso are the most professional on the team.”

“We’d just flown back from Abu Dhabi. Everyone was tired, but he went straight to a heat-session training… He’s become a real star. If he needs a toilet break, he hides, because the moment he stops, people flock for photos. He feels it all day long," the Belgian adds.

For some people, that glowing self-confidence at UAE might come across as a bit arrogant. Does Wellens feel that way too? “No, maybe that’s because I’m experiencing it from the inside,” he says. “It’s true there’s confidence. For example, during the briefing for GP Montréal we told each other: ‘We shouldn’t be stressed, we’re the best!’”

That turned out to be the case, as Pogacar handed the victory to teammate Brandon McNulty that day. “We smashed everything that day. I hope the competition doesn’t see that as arrogance. But I’d understand if there was some annoyance, because it has to be demotivating,” Wellens concludes sympathetically.