By: Emily Ao

This Sunday, Slovenian cyclist Tadej Pogacar won his third title in a row at the Tour de France, beating rivals Jonas Vingegaard of Denmark and Remco Evenepoel of Belgium.

Pogacar had set off last on the final time trial from Monaco to Nice, but he rode with full confidence, almost as if he was sure of success. According to a New York Times article, this was Pogacar’s sixth time winning a three-week run.

Pogar told the audience that in all his previous races, he had struggles or inconveniences; however, this time, his race went smoothly, almost too smoothly. “This year — everything to perfection. I am super happy to win here,” he says. Sure enough, Pogacar beat the others by 6 minutes and 17 seconds overall, a hard gap to compete with.

Between all the various time trials, Pogacar held a steady head start from his rivals with an average time of 3 minutes and 11 seconds each. For a while, many were sure that he would falter during the final two mountain stages which took place in the harsh Alps, but Pogacar sailed effortlessly though those too. In fact, Pogacar was able to increase the distance ahead of his opponents here.

On Saturday, even Vingegaard had realized that there was no catching up to Pogacar. Instead, he worked on surpassing Evenepoel, and eventually, the latter was left behind. The two leaders quickly passed their final competitor, Richard Carapaz of Ecuador, during the final half-mile. At the finish line, the winner was finalized as Pogacar.

After the final trial on Sunday, Pogacar had successfully completed a double, something that is achieved by winning two Grand tours in the same season (with him winning the Tour and Giro d’Italia). He became the first to beat the record in 26 years, when it was achieved by Marco Pantani in 1998.

In the past few years, either Pocagar or Vingegaard have claimed the titles of the three Grand tours. There is no telling about who will win in the years to come; it’ll be a tight race.