Tour de France 2021 - Tadej Pogacar – I expected more from GC rivals but we showed we're a strong team
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Updated 03/07/2021 at 19:52 GMT
It was certainly interesting to hear the new yellow jersey wearer talk about his surprise that he put in so much time into his rivals. Plus there was a clear demonstration that he is growing in confidence and is starting to have more of a say when it comes to tactics. You can watch the Tour de France live and ad-free on the Eurosport app and Eurosport.co.uk.
Pogacar: I was surprised by the amount of time I put in
New Tour De France leader Tadej Pogacar has said that he was surprised that he was able to put so much time into his rivals during his blistering Stage 8 attack.
The defending champion attacked with a little under 35 kilometres to go and no-one could live with his relentless pace as he tore into his opponents, moving into the race lead.
After the race Pogacar was asked whether he was always planning to attack like that but interestingly he said that he made the decision just before the three big climbs of the stage.
“No in the morning not really, I said we’ll see how it goes today,” the Slovenian said when asked of his plans.
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'Here he goes!' - Pogacar attacks away from peloton
Then to start it was a super-hard day, riders everywhere, at the moment I was in the breakaway and it was super-hard for everyone.
"In the end I felt good in this weather, it feels great and I just decided before the last three climbs I said to my team-mates ‘yeah let’s try to break the race’ and we did it.
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'Off the charts' - The Breakaway reacts to Tadej Pogacar
"Davide Formolo and Brandon [McNulty] and Rui [Costa] did such an amazing job and I just took off and tried to pace myself to the finish line and yeah I’m pretty happy.”
Pogacar was then asked whether he expected to be able to get so much time out of his rivals and the 22-year-old admitted that he did not.
“Yeah I suspected it after yesterday. We did a lot of attacking, they attacked us, they thought they could break us as a team
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Teuns comes home for emotional Stage win before new leader Pogacar rolls home
“I thought they will show more today but in the end I guess they were affected by yesterday and from today’s cold and rain.”
Finally he was asked whether Tadej Pogacar is now Tadej Pogacar’s biggest rival and he laughed and said “Yeah I think yes.
“We will see now we’re in yellow and we’re prepared to defend because we showed we are a super strong team.”
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Highlights: Catch up with everything from a barnstorming Stage 8 at the Tour de France
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