There are a few realities Tadej Pogačar must grapple with as he heads toward Paris-Roubaix in two and a half weeks. He is too small, for one. He’s too inexperienced on the French cobbles. He’s never raced Roubaix before (except as a junior, and that slimmed-down version in a 2022 Tour de France stage). He can’t outsprint riders like Mathieu van der Poel or Wout van Aert even in normal circumstances and has even less chance of doing so on a velodrome, where he has spent minimal time. Roubaix, if we’re honest, is not the race for Pogi.
But he is far and away the world’s best male bike racer and it would be foolish to write him off. He’ll have to be cunning and his team will have to be perfect, but there is a lightly trodden route to victory for riders of a similar style.
For insight, let’s turn to the 2019 edition of Paris-Roubaix. Philippe Gilbert was in the latter stages of his illustrious career and had studiously remade himself from the king of the Mur de Huy to a proper cobble-eating Belgian, trading some of the uphill kick that defined his early career for long-term power needed in the cobbled Classics. He’d won the Tour of Flanders in 2017 and two years later wanted a proper crack at Paris-Roubaix. He rode for Deceuninck-Quick Step, at that point still the dominant Classics team in the sport.
There are numerous similarities here. Both Pogačar and Gilbert won Flanders and two years later aimed at Roubaix. Both are similar in size and weight — Gilbert is the smallest Roubaix winner in recent memory and is around 2 cm taller and a bit more than 5 kg heavier than Pogačar. Like Pogačar, Gilbert was famous for his versatility, and a winner of four of the five Monuments – Lombardia in ‘09 and ‘10, Liège as part of his incredible 2011 season, and then a shift to the cobbles with a win at Flanders in 2017 and Roubaix in 2019. He was never a rider for the Grand Tours but in terms of one-day domination, he’s come as close to Pogačar as anybody since the turn of the millennium.
Their teams are similar, too. Quick Step of 2019 was a monster, with 22 victories by the time Roubaix rolled around that season. UAE is currently sitting on 21. Lining up alongside Gilbert that year were Yves Lampaert, Zdenek Stybar, and Florian Senechal, who would all ride into the top 11 that day. Likewise, Pogačar looks to line up with Nils Politt (who was second to Gilbert in 2019), Florian Vermeersch (2nd in 2021), and Tim Wellens, all of whom can put in a good ride on the cobbles. That’s key because, like Gilbert, Pogačar will need his team if he wants to win.
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