Tadej Pogačar: I’m looking forward to racing against Mathieu van der Poel at Liège-Bastogne-Liège

Tadej Pogačar has said he is feeling good and looking forward to some tough competition at Liège-Bastogne-Liège on Sunday.

Racing the Belgian Monument ahead of his planned Giro d’Italia and Tour de France double, the 2021 winner will line up on Sunday as perhaps the overwhelming favourite to win the climb-heavy race.

Mathieu van der Poel is the other big name on the start list, but for Pogačar, his prowess in the cobbled Classics doesn’t necessarily mean he’s also a big threat for Liège – though he will be a welcome competitor.

“I’m looking forward to race against Mathieu again,” he told the media at a press conference ahead of the race. “But I don’t think it’s just him to watch for this race, because this race suits a bit more climbers than heavier riders like Mathieu, but everybody knows that he can do everything.”

“Fun? Not really, because he’s so strong,” he added when asked about whether he will enjoy going up against the world champion. “But he’s a good competitor.”

Read more: Liège-Bastogne-Liège – 10 riders to watch

Liège-Bastogne-Liège is hard a race that is open to a lot of different scenarios, and despite being the main favourite, Pogačar is not discounting his rivals for 2024’s fourth Monument.

“I think it’s going to be a quite open race on Sunday, a lot of attacks from far. Anything can happen. It’s a very long race, one of the longest of the year, and a lot of altitude metres of climbing, so I would say it suits better the lighter riders.”

However, whilst Pogačar thinks that a lot of his competitors will be expecting a big, long-range attack from him or his team, that’s the one scenario he does not see happening on Sunday.

“No, that's not realistic,” he said. “Liège-Bastogne-Liège is not Strade or Roubaix. The toughest climbs here are deep in the final. If you attack early in Liège, it will be a very tough race.”

Another year with no Pogačar-Evenepoel battle

© Getty Images

Last time Tadej Pogačar won Liège-Bastogne-Liège was in 2021 ahead of Julian Alaphilippe

Though many will be excited at the possibility of a Pogačar-Van der Poel showdown, the real duel that Liège-Bastogne-Liège has been calling out for is the Slovenian versus Remco Evenepoel, but for the third year running circumstances will prevent that.

In 2022, Pogačar did not figure in the finale after a difficult run-in to the race, and in 2023 he crashed out before Evenepoel launched his winning move. On Sunday, Pogačar will be there in – he hopes – top form, but it’s Evenepoel’s turn to be out of contention, having broken his collarbone and shoulder blade in a crash in Itzulia Basque Country earlier this month.

“He won the two previous editions when I was not there in the final, and I was hoping to compete against him this year,” he said. “We both love this race. It would have been interesting to compete against each other, but just like last year when I crashed, we won’t get that now. Cycling sucks sometimes.”

Though he might not get the battle of titans he was hoping for on Sunday, Pogačar was confident about his shape going into the race, and also his general preparations for the next goals to come.

“I’m in pretty good shape now, I would say. I came from training camp. It’s been a lot of focus already on the Giro and the Tour, but I was still preparing for Sunday pretty well. For me actually, I really like this programme. It’s not too heavily packed so I get quite a lot [of time] for training and rest in between, so I’m pretty confident in this programme.”