Tadej Pogačar Can Reasonably Win Every Race He Enters This Season

Tadej Pogačar is about to unleash what could be cycling’s perfect season.

The big question mark a week before his 2026 season debut: can anyone stop him?

Cycling’s world No. 1 is set to debut at Strade Bianche on March 7 and won’t stop in what’s a streamlined, curated calendar wired for perfection.

All winter long, the Slovenian superstar has been signaling to his fans and rivals alike that he’s going to come out swinging.

Casually offloading his power numbers, a new Eminem-inspired hairstyle, a lucrative deal with a crypto trader — all is fine on Planet Pogi.

His winter flex should have his rival trembling even before clipping in.

All this matters because 2026 could see this generational freak at peak power.

UAE’s masterminds believe they can still squeeze out some incremental improvements, but the big gains over the past two or three years in diet, training, equipment, aerodynamics, and tactics have created modern cycling’s most complete racing machine.

The good news for his rivals is that he might be peaking; the bad news is that, at 27, he’s going to keep kicking everyone’s ass for years to come.

Could Pogačar do something that’s never been done before and win every race he starts?

Why not? Right now, almost no one is capable of stopping him. And he almost did it last year anyway.

Tailored for perfection

Everyone knows we’re seeing a once-in-a-lifetime phenomenon with Pogačar, and 2026 is stacking up to be his best version yet.

His rivals are fluxomed, and Pogačar and his team just seem to be getting better. That hasn’t stopped a deep flank of new and familiar rivals from stepping up even more. This season should see unprecedented high-level racing.

But the question begs: Will the outcome be any different?

What makes him unique is that he doesn’t seem to be racing on hate, revenge, or some other psychosis that seemed to have fueled so many of cycling’s big winners in the past.

And unlike the coal miners and farmers who were once slaves to the road, Pogačar is not racing for survival. Not in any existential sense.

He is the sport’s highest earner at north of $10 million per season, but the money is not the driver.

There’s a joy and youthful exuberance that pours out of his pedals.

His attacking style makes racing fun (at least for those of us watching from the couch).

His 50km bombs have rewritten modern cycling tactics and revived the glory of cycling’s past. It’s not a high-speed lead-out train with an attack 3km from the summit or sucking wheels and jumping with 500m to go.

Pogačar is the enemy of no one but a bane to everyone when the flag drops. Though he dismantles rivals on the road, he does not grind their faces in it afterward.

Despite being this century’s GOAT, he remains grounded, approachable, and disarmingly genuine. And this season should see the absolute expression of his talents.

Pogačar, at his core, is a pure racer, and you know he’s champing at the bit to get back out into the racing.

If he stays healthy and avoids a serious injury — he got lucky last year to avoid breaking bones in two high-speed wipeouts — many more records will fall this year.

We should savor this. It feels like the Michael Jordan era in the 1990s or Mikaela Shiffrin carving through slalom gates at full tilt.

Get out the popcorn. 2026 is going to be a good one.

The Merckx of our times

Just check this stat: In 2025, he won or podiumed in every race he started, except two: 29th at GP Québec and fourth at the world time trial championships.

That score line is freakish. Even in stage races, he won or finished in the top 5 of every stage that truly mattered. The obvious exception is the bunch sprints, where not even Pogačar is going to gamble against the raw horsepower of Jonathan Milan or Jasper Philipsen.

The other outliers were the long breakaway days, when Pogačar was content to lock down GC and let the stage hunters take their turn. After all, everyone gets a slice of the pie.

As the Badger once famously said, “No gifts.” Yet even Pogačar can be magnanimous, allowing UAE teammate Brandon McNulty to take victory at Grand Prix Cycliste de Montréal last season.

It’s not that Pogacar is being selfish. Rather, it’s that no one can beat him.

The headline now is when Pogacar doesn’t win.

In terms of being beaten outright, it’s only happened a few times over the last few years.

Matthias Skjelmose stunned him at Amstel Gold Race last spring in a messy three-up sprint. Van der Poel remains his bête noire on select one-day battlegrounds. And Evenepoel can take him down against the clock.

Jonas Vingegaard and Visma-Lease a Bike famously toppled him in 2022 and 2023 at the Tour, but Pogačar and UAE reloaded with a version that is stronger, wiser, and smarter. Visma is on its heels.

Backed by an ever-deeper bench at UAE, Pogačar’s biggest rival is keeping things interesting.

Monument madness

Pogačar enters 2026 with fresh ambitions to check off unfinished business.

The only rider who consistently threatens him is Mathieu van der Poel, and even that is limited to a handful of specific race days each year. We can thank the cycling gods for that.

Milano-San Remo and Paris-Roubaix — the two races where Van der Poel beat him head-to-head last year — are circled in thick red ink on the Pogi plan.

If Pogačar conquers both, he becomes only the fourth man in history to complete the monument sweep.

San Remo may be the trickier of the two.

There is a sense this year that Pogačar will light it up again on the Cipressa, ideally with a lieutenant such as Isaac del Toro in tow.

This could be the season he finds just enough to crack Van der Poel. The key would be prying open daylight on the Poggio and then fending off the fast men down the Via Roma.

Roubaix could fall as well. Last year, Pogačar appeared to have Van der Poel on the ropes before a botched corner evaporated his chances.

Van der Poel, thankfully, is also at the top of his game. San Remo, Tour of Flanders, and Roubaix should be off-the-charts fantastic.

As far as everything else goes in his spring calendar, who is gonna beat him at Strade Bianche, even with a slightly shorter course? No one. The same goes for the Ardennes.

A clean sweep of the classics and one-dayers is very possible.

Five-win club

And then for stage races, it’s like a scratched record.

He’s adding Tour de Romandie and Tour de Suisse to his career to-do list for 2026, and both of those races should see him take the flowers.

Despite rumblings from Evenepoel and others, his only real threat each July is Vingegaard, and Pogi seems to have the Dane’s number.

No rider — except Chris Froome — has won four yellow jerseys without winning a fifth.

Not that anything is becoming routine, but it’s hard to imagine anyone else stopping Pogačar from entering another one of cycling’s most elite clubs.

And what’s left? Montréal and worlds, two races he’s already dominating.

And then there’s Il Lombardia, a race where he’s won five straight years.

Betting markets do not even bother offering odds on Pogačar winning every race on his calendar. Such a feat is considered impossible in modern cycling. He starts as the five-star favorite in every race.

Arnaud De Lie said is much, arguing that Van der Poel and Pogačar are so much above his level that he’s not even going to bother racing Milan-San Remo.

Pogačar’s precise, curated calendar is a way to keep things light and fresh for the cycling superhero in 2026 who’s fast running out of nemeses.

There was a hint of burnout last year in what’s a talking point that continues to make the rounds inside the peloton.

What’s the anecdote? For 2026, it’s racing a bit less, but racing only the most quality and important races.

With the program he has lined up, no one can accuse him of padding stats or sandbagging.

Pogačar starts every race with the intention of winning. This year, he just might do it.