Despite Mathieu van der Poel’s powerful punches: “He is the strongest rider in the world, no doubt about it”

That has to be the case, because the Emirates team also demands a lot from its golden boy. For example, he rides both the Giro and the Tour. In his case, that doesn’t just mean riding along, but racing to win. Pogacar has also colored the spring, but so did Van der Poel in his rainbow jersey.

Mauro Gianetti, sports director at UAE, does not hide his opinion in a conversation with VELO. “Tadej is the strongest rider in the world, there is no doubt about that,” he said. Well, then the Slovenian can prove that again in the lap work in the coming months. Because in that area he was deprived of a triumph in previous years.

“Two years ago in the Tour it came down to one mistake by Tadej, perhaps because he was so strong and so good that he underestimated it a bit. We learned lessons from that. And it is no secret where things went wrong last year, if you fall two months before the Tour and have to stop training completely for three weeks.”

It was impossible to camouflage that. “In cycling you train or you lose fitness. No other rider in the world could finish second in the Tour de France after what happened to him last year. So we have every confidence in him.”