There is something inexplicably magnificent, breathtaking, brilliant and exhilarating about the way Tadej Pogacar has taken Flanders for the second time, in a race that was held in atypically perfect conditions for Flanders, and which has really shown who is the best in the cobbled genre, who can read cycling well in 2025, and who is the leader in tactics and luck, in the two most important aspects of a one-day classic.
Who could combine the latter two absolutely perfectly? Nobody. Somehow, one had the feeling that one approach or the other would come out on top, but knowing the route, it was very clear that, although both Lidl-Trek and Visma-LAB had shown a near-perfect team performance, the duo of van der Poel and Pogacar, who clearly had the upper hand in the climbs, would eventually rise above them. Let's start with them, perhaps the two can be lumped together, although they come from two very different backgrounds.
In Pedersen's case, we're talking about a man who is basically having a career-peak year, putting up brilliant numbers, consistently having possibly the strongest team, but at the same time Pedersen hasn't necessarily always been able to translate that team performance into an individual level - this was particularly evident at last year's Ronde, where he attacked inexplicably early, shooting himself in the foot to get a good result. Somewhere I expected the same from him this year, but fortunately that's not what I got. A very composed, very deliberate Pedersen came in this time, burning less energy than in previous years thanks in large part to Jasper Stuyven, who also had his best classic season in years this March, and it certainly kept Mads in the top group for a very long time. I thought he could win here, which has never happened at the Ronde - and I think the final runner-up finish must have given him satisfaction.
Wout van Aert and Visma in general - I also got more than I expected from them. I think it was particularly important for them to send Benoot up front, because it allowed them to take some of the pressure off van Aert and Jorgenson, the American has really pushed himself to the absolute limits for WvA and it looks like Koppenberg will be his nemezis, his cryptonite, because he's somehow lost contact with the front group for the second year running. I can't say they controlled things, they did not necessarily anticipate, but the relative neutral role they took on suited them very well, and I think Wout did what he could, there was nothing left in him, he was a week of more training and form building away from having a serious chance at the Ronde. What does that mean? It will be excellent this Sunday at Roubaix.
Alpecin-Deceuninck. They really messed up this race in a way they don't usually do - in positioning. What they showed in the pre-crash section, to have Mathieu van der Poel in the last third of the peloton, is almost unacceptable from a team that knows the terrain so well, that is well put together, that is supposed to be organized and knows which parts of the race to pay serious attention to. I couldn't believe what I was seeing. Obviously catching up there took a good chunk out of van der Poel, that's indisputable, but they brought this problem on themselves. And they were compounded when van der Poel was on the outer perimeter of Liege on the second Kwaremont climb instead of Pogacar's wheel, and though obviously he caught up with the first group, but there was no room for any unnecessary expenditure of energy in those situations, these were criminally big mistakes at that level. Without them, would van der Poel have had the sprint he so desperately wanted? Possibly. It could have been done, more likely a 1v1 TT at the end 11 kilometres, anything could have happened there.
But a certain young Slovenian man wouldn't let that happen. And Pogacar's greatness is perhaps shown by the fact that this time it came down to team strength in addition to individual performance, what Morgado, Bjerg and Vermeersch did in the 80-55 section, mostly out of control, was very much needed to then take out Ganna and deprive the other teams of building a numerical advantage over him until the end of the race, the leadership Tadej showed surpassed everyone last Sunday. In the 55-35km section, he really did some peak cycling, showing all the beauty of this incredibly difficult sport, attacking on the hills, attacking on the cobbles, attacking on the flat, showing himself and his strength - and well, the last Kwaremont... Which is really starting to become Pogimont, because he has an incredible feel for the mountain, perhaps almost predictably perfect feel, with good scouting in the future, these attacks can be eliminated, but at the same time, the way he hard dropped van der Poel was quite eerie and gave me serious goosebumps. I don't know such an attack can be done this Sunday at Roubaix. If he can do it, and if he wins Paris-Roubaix on his debut, then he really is unbeatable, he really should be ranked at the top of the greatest of all time discussion at the age of 26.