{"id":426459,"date":"2025-09-15T14:24:10","date_gmt":"2025-09-15T14:24:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/426459\/"},"modified":"2025-09-15T14:24:10","modified_gmt":"2025-09-15T14:24:10","slug":"was-a-bit-afraid-to-travel-to-canada","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/426459\/","title":{"rendered":"\u201cWas a bit afraid to travel to Canada\u201d"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><b>It doesn\u2019t happen often that a team leader gives away a victory, but when <a href=\"https:\/\/www.idlprocycling.com\/tadej-pogacar\" title=\"Tadej Pogacar\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Tadej Pogacar<\/a> was <a href=\"https:\/\/www.idlprocycling.com\/cycling\/after-vuelta-criticism-uae-and-pogacar-deliver-cycling-masterclass-in-montreal-world-champion-lets-mcnulty-take-the-win\" target=\"_self\" rel=\"noopener\">in front at the GP Montr\u00e9al<\/a> and his teammate <a href=\"https:\/\/www.idlprocycling.com\/brandon-mcnulty\" title=\"Brandon McNulty\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Brandon McNulty<\/a> was closing in, the world champion waited and handed him the win. Not a tough decision, Pogacar said afterward. Because <a href=\"https:\/\/www.idlprocycling.com\/cycling\/mcnulty-realizes-how-unique-pogacar-geste-and-bizarre-uae-dominance-was-tadej-asked-if-i-wanted-to-try-it-solo\/preview\" target=\"_self\" rel=\"noopener\">besides McNulty being very strong<\/a>, he himself didn\u2019t have the absolute \u201csuper legs.\u201d<\/b>That may sound odd, since Pogacar had UAE Team Emirates-XRG ride full gas all day and sent McNulty up the road. He then attacked himself. \u201cI saw that Brandon was really strong, just like the whole team today. We thinned out the peloton quite quickly because we were riding such a high tempo. And then I told Brandon that if he wanted to go, he could attack,\u201d <a href=\"https:\/\/x.com\/cyclingontnt\/status\/1967324512086893046\" target=\"_blank\">he analyzed afterward<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI joined him at the top of the climb. Together we pushed on,\u201d continued the rainbow jersey wearer. \u201cWhen I got out front alone, Brandon managed to bridge across, and then it was pretty clear who would win. It was probably the slowest sprint of my career, yeah,\u201d he said laughing.<\/p>\n<p>Continue reading below the video<\/p>\n<p>Pogacar didn\u2019t ride for a week before Canadian doubleheaderPogacar and McNulty put third-place Quinn Simmons (Lidl\u2013Trek) more than a minute behind, but according to Pogi it was still quite surprising that he performed so well after <a href=\"https:\/\/www.idlprocycling.com\/cycling\/pogacar-improves-least-result-in-unpredictable-quebec-van-aert-also-remains-glum\" target=\"_self\" rel=\"noopener\">a rather disappointing GP Qu\u00e9bec<\/a>. \u201cI was a bit afraid to travel to Canada, because last week I was sick the entire week. I couldn\u2019t complete my planned training sessions, so I didn\u2019t know what my form would be like here.\u201dAt the press conference, with <a href=\"https:\/\/sporza.be\/nl\/2025\/09\/14\/cadeautje-leek-uit-zelfvertrouwen-maar-pogacar-trok-bang-naar-canada-door-ziekte-week-niet-kunnen-trainen~1757880337536\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Sporza<\/a> among those present, Pogacar admitted: \u201cMy legs weren\u2019t great, but I gained some confidence here. So it was a good choice to come after all.\u201d Especially since UAE, with the win in Montr\u00e9al, equaled HTC-Columbia\u2019s 2009 record of 85 victories in a season. \u201cWe\u2019re super proud of all those wins.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>As Pogacar explained: \u201cIt\u2019s been a very successful season for the team, with many guys getting the chance to win, and they\u2019ve taken those chances. They\u2019ve shown how hard they work; almost everyone in our team already has a victory.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"It doesn\u2019t happen often that a team leader gives away a victory, but when Tadej Pogacar was in&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":426460,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4104],"tags":[4230,79,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-426459","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-cycling","8":"tag-cycling","9":"tag-sports","10":"tag-uk","11":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115208772942980786","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/426459","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=426459"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/426459\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/426460"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=426459"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=426459"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=426459"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}