{"id":25472,"date":"2026-07-04T20:08:58","date_gmt":"2026-07-04T11:08:58","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/crankpunk.com\/?p=25472"},"modified":"2026-07-04T20:09:02","modified_gmt":"2026-07-04T11:09:02","slug":"could-pogacar-wear-yellow-from-barcelona-to-paris","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/crankpunk.com\/ja\/2026\/07\/04\/could-pogacar-wear-yellow-from-barcelona-to-paris\/","title":{"rendered":"Could Poga\u010dar Wear Yellow From Barcelona to Paris?"},"content":{"rendered":"

See what he’s making us do? Not just wondering if <\/em>he can win it, now I’m wondering is this is possible… <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Every single day in Yellow?<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Tour hasn’t opened with a team time trial since 1971. It hasn’t seen a rider hold Yellow start-to-finish since Jacques Anquetil in 1961. The moment I saw decided to fo with a TTT + summit-finish for Stage 1, I started hmmming.<\/em>..<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So let’s actually look at it the feasibility of this.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Precedent<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Wire-to-wire yellow is rare because the Tour is designed to punish exactly that kind of ownership. Anquetil managed it in 1961 on the back of a dominant prologue and total team control. Merckx came close to this kind of dominance of the race outright across his prime years without ever actuallty doing it. The format almost never allows it \u2014 sprint stages, crosswinds, an off day, a mechanical, the odd ambush, and of course the exhaustion of it, physically and mentally \u2014 you could say there are 21 chances for something to go wrong.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

The Case for it Happening<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Poga\u010dar starts this Tour in the form of his life, fresh off a dominant 2025 title defense and no signs of decline in 2026. He’s the best around, most likely of all time, and he could pull this off – we’d never say that about any of the other GC contenders, not even any of the other winners in the past 25 years. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

    \n
  • Stage 1 suits him perfectly.<\/strong> A TTT that king of isn’t a TTT and ends on a real climb (Montju\u00efc into Stade Olympique) with individual timing means Poga\u010dar isn’t relying on domestiques to drag him to a shared time \u2014 he can simply ride away from his own leadout on the final ramps and take seconds directly off Vingegaard and Evenepoel before the race has even properly started. Heck, he could likely ride away half way through and still win it.<\/li>\n\n\n\n
  • UAE is built for this.<\/strong> With del Toro alongside him, the team has the horsepower to control a TTT and defend a jersey on the front for three weeks. We may have the situation that if Pogacar doesn’t control Yello for the entire Tour, he and Del Toro may share it for 3 weeks. Pogi wins the TTT, in the mountains whilst the others are watching him, DT wins a stage and takes 30 secondfs, then the reverse it a few days later. <\/li>\n\n\n\n
  • His TT form is scary.<\/strong> Recent results against van der Poel and the rest of the world’s best time triallists confirm this isn’t a weakness anymore \u2014 it’s another weapon.<\/li>\n\n\n\n
  • Depth advantage.<\/strong> If UAE take yellow day one, they have the roster to control racing through the flat and hilly stages that follow, denying rivals the free hits that usually chip away at a first-week leader.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n

    The Case Against It<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
      \n
    • Someone else could simply be faster on Saturday.<\/strong> Netcompany-Ineos have built a TTT super-team around Ganna and Foss specifically to strike on stage 1. If Poga\u010dar doesn’t personally hold the fastest time up that final ramp, yellow starts on someone else’s shoulders and so UAE just chill til the hills arrive.<\/li>\n\n\n\n
    • Three weeks is a long time.<\/strong> Bad days happen to everyone, including him. One crosswind split, one crash, one off day in the third week, and the jersey’s gone.<\/li>\n\n\n\n
    • Rivals do exist – kinda.<\/strong> Vingegaard arrives having already won the Giro. Evenepoel has reshaped his whole season around this race. Seixas is a tru wild card. None of these guys is going to roll over without some kind of a fight. Whether Pogacar will even notice though is anther matter.<\/li>\n\n\n\n
    • History says it basically never happens anymore.<\/strong> No one has done it start-to-finish in the modern three-week era. The format, the depth of the peloton, and the sheer number of days working against you make it a genuinely brutal ask \u2014 and seriusly, who’d want that hassle… apsrt from a guy who loves to dominate everyone and has the skillset to do it?!<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n

      Verdict <\/h2>\n\n\n\n

      If Poga\u010dar wins Stage 1 outright \u2014 beats Ganna’s team, beats Vingegaard, and if he isn’t already planning to ‘put’ Del Toro in Yellow \u2014 he’s got a better shot than anyone in the last 60 years at going the distance with this. His form, his team, and this specific parcours all line up in his favour.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

      It will need luck, and then finally, can he be bothered<\/p>\n\n\n\n

      I think if the fancy takes him, the answer will be yes, and it wil; consolidate his claim to be the greatest bike racer of all time. <\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

      21 days in Yellow? You know what… it might just be possible!<\/p>","protected":false},"author":40955418,"featured_media":25482,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_coblocks_attr":"","_coblocks_dimensions":"","_coblocks_responsive_height":"","_coblocks_accordion_ie_support":"","wpupg_custom_link":[],"wpupg_custom_link_behaviour":[],"wpupg_custom_link_nofollow":[],"wpupg_custom_image":[],"wpupg_custom_image_id":[],"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_wpcom_ai_launchpad_first_post":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"{title}\n\n{excerpt}\n\n{url}","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"_wpas_customize_per_network":false,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[159546164,767234206,1,112364],"tags":[767233898,767234210,767234212,2589097,102520247,74634611,99461,767233557,2345,721158212],"class_list":["post-25472","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-punkopinion","category-tour-de-france","category-uncategorized","category-world-tour","tag-767233898","tag-3-weeks-yellow","tag-5-wins","tag-anquetil","tag-evenepoel","tag-pogacar","tag-stage-1","tag-tour-de-france","tag-ttt","tag-vingegaard"],"aioseo_notices":[],"aioseo_head":"\n\t\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t