Everything pointed to it and it’s official. Tadej Pogacar (UAE Team) will start his season in Spain. Specifically, in the Clásica Jaén Paraíso Interior, which will hold its second edition in a week, on Monday, February 13. “We are working on it. I don’t know if Pogacar is more excited to be there or to us to have him. We are pulling so that it does not debut elsewhere and that it does so here. Now, there is an 80% chance”, assured the Spanish coach and the technical director of the event, Pascual Momparler, during its presentation. And it is a fact. Alongside the Slovenian talent, the Emirates team will feature Alessandro Covi, Marc Hirschi, Domen Novak, Tadej Pogacar, Matteo Trentin and Tim Wellens. A good part of the squad, with pogi Including, he will also extend his stay in Andalusia to participate in the Tour of Andalusia, from the 15th to the 19th of this month. Covi and Wellens, who will also repeat, will be joined by Sjoerd Bax, Rafal Majka and Domen Novak.
“I am excited for these races and to put on a number again and be with the team. I have been watching the first races the last few weeks on TV and enjoying itbut also wanting to take action”, Pogacar has expressed in statements provided by the UAE itself. The two-time Tour champion, who suffered from gastroenteritis in January, thus definitively advances his debut in a season in which he wants to regain the Parisian throne. “The preparation has been good. I had a bit of gastroenteritis in January which was not very pleasant, but luckily I got over it and feel healthy. It’s good to experience new races and I’m looking forward to seeing what Jaén and Andalucía have in store for us. I can’t wait to start competing again”, he adds in his words.
The Tour, with Adam Yates and Wellens as squires, will once again be his great objective. Before, he will look for his peak of form accumulating victories, as he usually does. After the Andalusian tour, he will continue on a path full of successes to revalidate: Strade Bianche and Tirreno Adriatico. In the spotlight, also the Tour of Flanders. “We have many things that are going to go very well for him. Especially this year, that he has set Strade Bianche and Flanders. He has changed a lot of material on his bike and I think the Clásica Jaén is a good test for him to try it out”, Momparler analyzed. very correctly. “Obviously, the dirt aspect of Jaén makes it a good place to test equipment and bicycles, so it is a race that offers a lot”, explains the director and Team Manager of the UAE, Matxin, agreeing with him.
Spain for the Emirates
With official confirmation from the team, Pogacar’s season, for the first since 2021, will not start in the United Arab Emirates, where the Slovenian used to start by running his team’s stage round, the UAE Tour, with back-to-back wins. The decision, for all this, is surprising at the level of sponsorships. “We are going with a high-quality squad, led by Pogacar who will also debut here (in Andalusia) this season. For Tadej, the plan this year was to keep the base of the calendar more or less the same and make some adjustments, which is what we have done. Tadej is a cyclist who likes to keep things fresh and try new things., so starting the year here in Jaén and Andalucía made sense. The season will be long, so our idea is to gradually reach the bigger objectives”, explains Matxin. pogi starts with a Spanish double.