“TO WIN THE BIGGEST RACE IN THE WORLD IS JUST BEYOND ANY DREAM.”
Ten years ago, cyclist Andrej Hauptman was scouting prospects when he spotted a racer trailing the pack by 100 metres. Much younger than the rest, he was struggling to keep up. As a Road World Championship medalist and head of selectors for the Slovenian national cycling team, Hauptman’s words carried weight when he advised the race organisers to provide support for the young man. It was then they informed him that the scrawny 13-year-old wasn’t in last place. He was, in fact, about to lap the competition. The racer was Tadej Pogačar, who went on to win the 2020 Tour de France. At the age of 22, the Slovenian cyclist who rides for UAE Team Emirates is the youngest winner of the famed race in 111 years.
“I had my dreams, my visions, but it was not quite like it happened. It is bigger now than in my dreams and fantasies,” he tells us. Last year he also took home the Tour’s coveted white jersey (for best young cyclist), and the polka-dot jersey (for “King of the Mountain”). “It was totally unexpected to win the first time I’m on the start of the Tour. I never imagined it. When I was younger, I dreamed of riding the Tour, to just be there competing in it. What happened in the Tour is still amazing to me. To win the biggest race in the world alongside the two other jerseys I won, it is just bigger than any dream.”
This story is from the July 2021 edition of MAXIM Australia.
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This story is from the July 2021 edition of MAXIM Australia.
Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 8,500+ magazines and newspapers.
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