The risk of flying too close to the Slovenian sun
Richard Abraham on the fate that can befall those who try to enter Pogačar's orbit
by Richard Abraham
‘It cost me my entire race trying to follow Pogačar. If you come too close to the sun, you get burned’ – Mattias Skjelmose to Danish TV after Liège-Bastogne-Liège, April 21, 2024.
‘When you sail too close to the sun, you get stung. I was brave. I always wanted to try and follow Pog, but I was probably the dumbest guy in the race’ – Ben O’Connor, Giro d’Italia stage two, May 5, 2024, as reported by GCN
The words of two professional cyclists just a few weeks apart but united by a shared experience of trying – and failing – to follow Tadej Pogačar when he’s in the mood.
Whether O’Connor had read Skjelmose’s comments before the Giro began or whether the metaphor came to both riders organically doesn’t really matter – both caught my eye and the mental image was the same.
Think Roman mosaic, or neoclassical oil painting. A doomed figure tumbling to the earth as he realises all too late the folly of daring to fly too close to the sun. Replace the muscular Greek athlete type with a skinny, tan-lined guy in a helmet. Meanwhile there’s Pogačar in the top corner, the sun, with those tufts of bleach-blond dyed hair poking out of his helmet like rays and that goofy ‘sun-has-got-his-hat-on-hip-hip-hip-hip-hooray’ grin of his.
It’s a cautionary tale about the danger of hubris. Icarus, while fleeing imprisonment on Crete with his father Daedalus, takes to the air on wings constructed of feathers and beeswax. Ignoring his father’s caution, he soars too high. The sun’s rays melt the wax and Icarus soon tumbles to the sea.
Perhaps it resonated in my mind because for Lionel and me the sun has been no more than a distant memory until recent days; the idea of getting a bit too much of it before plunging into the Mediterranean is something I wouldn’t have minded actively pursuing. Also here, for me in Oxford, May Morning is fresh in the memory. Nothing fires up the neo-pagan sun-worshipper within you like a 6am pint of ale followed by some Morris dancing. For our non-British listeners/readers with a quizzical eyebrow raised… I’m sorry but there isn’t time to explain. It’s 11.01 and my cappuccino is getting cold.
Perhaps the image resonated because, in a bike racing sense, it has seemed this year that anyone who dares fly within range of Pogačar on terrain of his choosing is doomed to both failure and a certain amount of ignominy. You tried to go with Pogačar, dummy, now look what you’ve done. At least O’Connor is still in the race, although at the time of writing there are approximately 12 hours before the results of the stage seven time trial, which represents plenty of time for O’Connor to plummet down into the GC sea.
To run a little further with the metaphor, the cast cannot help but be drawn into the orbit of the Pogačar-system should Tadej decide to turn up. So too the organisers, for whom Pogačar is big shot number one, and the press, for whom it is easy frame the race as Pogačar versus the rest.
The temptation to fly high, to be ‘drawn by the desire for the heavens’, however remains strong. Jhonatan Narváez proved it can be achieved with victory on stage one of the race last weekend. Yet on the kind of form he seems to be on, trying to beat Pogačar at his own game can appear instantly reckless if it doesn’t work. O’Connor found this out trying to follow Pogačar on the road to Oropa on stage two. Listen to the recent Kilometre Zero episode – Sierra Alpha – and be reminded by Rafał Majka that even Pogačar’s own teammates regularly run the risk of getting singed.
It’s worth bearing in mind in all this that, just before casting off, Daedalus also warned Icarus not too fly too low lest his wings become heavy with the moisture of the sea. Complacency, then, can also be a killer. Just ask Alpecin-Deceuninck, Soudal-Quickstep, Lidl-Trek et al, who all flew too low on stage four.
The moral of the story is to take the middle road, however narrow. It is as relevant for Pogačar as it is for his opponents. Piecing together a Grand Tour victory – not least two in a row – requires maintaining a delicate flight path.
Put in an attack in the first week of the Giro, wallow a little too long in that wonderful feeling of form and flow, and you might start to feel the first indicators that feathers are shuffling loose. Send poor old Domen Novak to the front (again) and feel that drip of hot wax trickle down your forearm as you burn through your teammates. Suddenly, when you need to keep some altitude, you start to flap and you realise your feathers are altogether gone because of something you did two months earlier. It’s stage 18 of the Tour de France and it’s too late. ‘Let me warn you, Tadej, to take the middle way.’
Yet when I picture riders in the pull of Pogačar like little planets orbiting a Slovenian sun, Geraint Thomas isn’t one of them. For some reason he seems to exist outside this paradigm, probably because this ain’t his first rodeo.
When Geraint made his Giro debut it was 2008, I was doing my A-Levels, and Pogačar was nine years old. The Giro’s defending champion was Danilo Di Luca, the odds-on pre-race favourite was Andreas Klöden, and the final podium comprised Alberto Contador, Riccardo Riccò and Marzio Bruseghin. Two thirds of stage wins went to Italians. Come vola il tempo.
His following Giro was in 2012 – on both occasions, the Giro was prep for the team pursuit at the Olympic Games – and Thomas was Pogačar’s current age, 25. That year was my first Giro and I wished Thomas and Ian Stannard a happy birthday as they grovelled up the Alpe di Pampeago in the final week.
That took place just before that remarkable summer of British cycling success that suddenly feels such a long time ago (although seeing Ineos ride the way they have in this first week of the Giro has wound that clock back a little). This year, Thomas’s birthday happens to fall on stage 20, the Monte Grappa stage, when he turns 38. A lot of suns have risen and set in that career.
For some reason I’m minded instead to dwell on another aspect of the Icarus myth, which is that in some tellings Icarus does no flying at all. In one version there is no messing around with feathers, no melting beeswax. The sun is up there in the sky, watching on, as Icarus and Daedalus just get in a boat and sail away.
From the KM0 Vault: Napule: City of Gods
by Lionel Birnie
One of my favourite days on any Grand Tour was May 14, 2022. It was a scorching hot Saturday and we got up early to head to Pompeii, the ancient city near Naples, for one of Daniel’s diversions. For an hour or so, we were like tourists. We paid for our tickets and wandered around the streets of a Roman city that was buried under the eruption of Mount Vesuvius. We took photos and recorded bits for that night’s episode, linking everything back to cycling by making jokes about the size of the cobblestones and Patrick Lefevere as a Roman emperor-type figure. Some of it even made the cut.
When we got to the city, we parked the car in an underground car park run by some very dubious characters and all afternoon had an uneasy feeling that we’d return to find the garage closed up and no sign of the car, our belongings or the guys who’d taken our money.
As I usually do when I feel worried, I went for something to eat, and had a fantastic, simple pizza. Fortunately, all was well with the car, but as we left the crowds and graffiti behind I was filled with a sense that Napoli was a city of chaos and energy – as well as Diego Maradona, and Ciro, of course – and I wanted to go back, preferably when Napoli are also playing at home.
Last year, the Giro returned and Daniel made an absolutely brilliant episode of KM0 which got under the skin of the city in a way I cannot possible do in a few sentences. It’s on our Friends of the Podcast subscriber feed but you can also listen to it here to get in the mood for a third consecutive visit to the city on Sunday.
Listen to Napule: City of Gods
The Girovagando case from DVine Cellars
The 2024 Girovagando case of six wines, curated by our friends at DVine Cellars, is available to buy now.
Il Barone’s photo gallery
Enter the Slipstream – UK theatrical premiere next week
Don’t forget tickets are available for three screenings of Enter the Slipstream, made behind-the-scenes with the EF Pro Cycling team during the 2020 ‘lockdown’ Tour de France, next week.
If you want to see the film, you can buy tickets for all three screenings below.
London – Via Atelier on Thursday, May 16 at 6pm
18-19 Stable Street, London
Tickets
Alderley Edge – Velo Edge on Saturday, May 18 at 5.30pm
48a London Road, Alderley Edge
Tickets
Glasgow – Drygate Brewery on Sunday, May 19 at 5.30pm
85 Drygate, Glasgow
Tickets
Stage seven of our Girovagando coverage will be on air tonight. Join Daniel and Brian in Italy as they recap the first time trial of the race and assess what damage has been done to the general classification. The 11.01 Cappuccino will be back on Monday.
A big thank you to MAAP for supporting The Cycling Podcast. Check out the full range of clothing to make you look the part on, and off, the bike at maap.cc
Beautifully written.
What a fantastic 11.01. Love Richard's writing, and this doesn't disappoint. What a great first 7 days of Giro coverage by all.