Tour of Catalonia: Tadej Pogacar launches Operation Giro 2024

Two days after his third place in Milan-Sanremo, Tadej Pogacar launches Operation Giro 2024 on Monday during the Tour of Catalonia which will serve as a launching pad towards his next big spring objective. The Slovenian “cannibal” aims, at the age of 25, to become the first rider since Marco Pantani in 1998 to win the Tour of Italy (May 4-26) and the Tour de France (June 29-July 21) in the same year. And it is in Catalonia that he wants to lay the foundations for this colossal challenge over seven often mountainous stages, with 23 climbs in total, three summit finishes and a final hilly day on Sunday in Barcelona.

“The course is demanding, clearly cut out for climbers and attackers. We arrive with a strong team and adversity will be strong too. It will be fun to follow,” underlines “Pogi” who is running the event for the first time with, as always, the firm intention of adding it to his gargantuan track record. The field is slightly lower than in Paris-Nice or Tirreno-Adriatico, the first two major one-week races of the season, won on March 10 by Matteo Jorgenson ahead of Remco Evenepoel in Nice and Jonas Vingegaard in Italy.

But the cast remains very interesting with several Grand Tour winners like Sepp Kuss, winner of the last Vuelta, Nairo Quintana, Egan Bernal, Geraint Thomas as well as young nuggets like the Frenchman Lenny Martinez and the Belgian Cian Uijtedebroeks. Arriving with disparate ambitions and fitness levels, they will try to catch on to the frenzied train of the Slovenian elf who exudes health.

In just two races, at the beginning of March at Strade Bianche and Saturday at Milan-Sanremo, Pogacar made a strong impression. In Sanremo, he didn't miss much to win his fourth different Monument, despite a route that wasn't very conducive to his qualities because it wasn't steep enough. He left with a first podium, behind Jasper Philipsen and Michael Matthews, and the promise of returning next year to aim for victory again and again. “Next year, I’m not going to be satisfied with second place,” he warned.

In Catalonia, he will find longer passes and harder slopes where it will be easier for him to make the difference. The event also helps him get back into the rhythm of a stage race which will be his first since the last Tour de France, where he finished, like the previous year, second behind Vingegaard. The leader of the UAE team will be supported in particular by the Portuguese Joao Almeida and the French Pavel Sivakov, returning from injury. The two men are also expected to escort him on the Grande Boucle this summer. After the Tour of Catalonia, Pogacar will skip the Flandriennes, but must still race Liège-Bastogne-Liège, before returning to Italy to discover the Giro and continue to write history.