Barring serious incident, illness or injury, it’s incredibly likely Tadej Pogačar will win the 2026 Tour de France. There might be as many six more general classification days to come in eight stages, but with the form he has shown so far in this race, the strongest team here, and crucially 3:36 over second place, it feels rather inevitable.
If he achieves this, then the UAE Team Emirates-XRG rider will join an exclusive club of five-time Tour winners, equalling the record, alongside the greats: Jacques Anquetil, Eddy Merckx, Bernard Hinault and Miguel Induráin. Five five-time winners, it has a ring to it.
There is one issue with this Lance Armstrong. The American ‘won’ seven titles between 1999 and 2005, titles that were later stripped from him after he was found to have used performance enhancing drugs through his career. Officially, no-one won those Tours, due to the whole era being tainted with doping.
Therefore, officially, Pogačar will equal the record if he wins a fifth Tour in just over a week. However, unofficially, will he have broken the record? Armstrong, for his part, used his podcast The Move this week to press his case, which has never claimed to be an impartial space. “He knows damn well what the real record is,” the Texan said, suggesting that Pogačar would go on to try and win seven.
In his post-stage 13 press conference, the Slovenian addressed the question: “I got this question in the morning. I don’t know, I can’t say anything. I don’t go for records, I just want to finish this Tour with yellow in Paris, that’s the main focus.”
He has said he doesn’t care about records before, but this is the same rider who is clearly trying to win Paris-Roubaix so he has won all five Monuments, who won Tour de Romandie and the Tour de Suisse this year on his quest to win every major stage race, who told L’Équipe that he wants to be the best in history. Why would he be doing all of this if he didn’t care about records?
The Armstrong argument feels like a sideshow, particularly for a cyclist who was only six when he ‘won’ his last Tour, but it is interesting that Pogačar feels he “can’t say anything” on the topic. Perhaps he will only be sated once he does break the unofficial as well as the official record; perhaps it doesn’t matter which record he’s going for, if this crushing form lasts.
On that crushing form, the world champion seemed slightly irked when asked what he would say to his rivals who feel like they are now racing for second place.
“I don’t know how to respond to that,” Pogačar said. “If you go for only second place, then it’s a pity. In a Grand Tour, when you have a strong team around you, there are so many possibilities, you have to hope for the best. That’s my opinion.”
It is difficult to hope for the best when the race appears to be heading in only one direction. The weekend could be key, but it is difficult to see a scenario where he hasn’t extended his lead by Sunday evening.
“It could be a day for a lot of attacks, it’s a playground for that,” he said of Saturday’s stage 14, with its three first-category climbs. “I hope we can set a good pace that’s good for us and not easy for the others. We will see.
“Tomorrow will be a tough day, and we have to be prepared for any attacks from the contenders. It will be good to watch on the TV like every day.”
