Tour de France: 100th victory for Tadej Pogacar, the would-be Cannibal of world cycling

What can I say? The Gotha of world cycling packed into the handkerchief of a sprint. All this on a day still characterised by breakaways, counter-escapes and several crashes in which Italian Mattia Cattaneo and Irishman Ben Healy were also involved. A cycling with the devil in the body that was seen in the North, without ever a break or a moment of tiredness.

Pogacar's victory, number 100 in a career that is beginning to overshadow even that of Eddy Merkcx, is obviously a special one. Because it draws, at the age of 26, a first balance sheet of a rider who has now become a dominator of contemporary cycling. His successes include 3 Tour de France, 1 Giro d'Italia, 2 Tours of Flanders, 3 Liège-Bastogne-Liège, 4 Tours of Lombardy and last but not least, the World Championships in Zurich in 2024.

A complete champion, the Slovenian, who only finds one real opponent in stage races: that Jonas Vingegaard who twice (2022 and 2023) managed to snatch the Tour de France from him. However, Vingegaard only managed to beat him in July, in the French race. During the year he almost always disappears.

In one-day races, the role of spoilsport is played with great punctuality by Van Der Poel himself, as he demonstrated at Milano Sanremo and Roubaix this year.

Returning to the Tour, it is worth mentioning that this Wednesday, 9 July, the fifth stage, features the first time trial, an almost flat 33-kilometre test starting and finishing in Caen, also in northern France.

Pogacar, who also took back the polka-dot jersey of best climber, will try to shake up the general classification, which, however, already sees him in first place with Mathieu Van Der Poel. Behind Pogacar, only eight seconds behind, is Vingegaard, who will do everything he can to put a spoke in his wheels.

As third wheel, among the big names, could emerge the Belgian Remco Evenepoel, who so far, between crashes and fans, has not had much luck. A time specialist, the Belgian has a chance to catch up with a delay - of almost a minute - that could otherwise become a heavy handicap. But watch out for those two: Pogacar and Vingegaard, as they have shown, have no desire for discounts or charity. It is not in their DNA. They are not good Samaritans. They are predators, extraordinary goal hunters.