World champion Tadej Pogacar pulled ahead of 19-year-old French debutant Paul Seixas in the final climb to secure his third straight Liege-Bastogne-Liege title on Sunday, his fourth overall victory in the race.
The UAE Team Emirates-XRG rider finished the 259.5-km race in five hours, 50 minutes and 28 seconds to win the 13th monument title of his career and his third of the year after the Tour of Flanders and Milan-San Remo.
"It means a lot to win again one of the biggest races of the year, of cycling... there’s a lot of pressure on me to deliver, I’m really happy that we succeeded," said Pogacar, who is now one Liege title short of Belgium's Eddy Merckx, who won the race a record five times between 1969 and 1975.
Seixas kept up with Pogacar when the Slovenian stuck to the plan that brought him success in the last two years and launched his attack on the climb at the Cote de la Redoute, staying on the four-time Tour de France winner's wheel for nearly 20km while others fell behind.
But during the climb to Cote de la Roche-aux-Faucons, with less than 14km left in the race, the 27-year-old Pogacar sped ahead, leaving an exhausted Seixas behind.
Seixas, who was trying to become the first Frenchman to win the Liege title since 1980, finished 45 seconds after Pogacar, while Belgian two-time winner Remco Evenepoel won a sprint for third place.
“Today, a lot happened. At the beginning, I was at the back. It is always hard at the start so I just followed the wheels, I looked down and I saw we were going fast. In one moment, I looked up and the group was split. But after 20 minutes, we realised it was not so bad to let them go," said four-time Tour de France champion Pogacar.
“These kinds of breakaways with a big group rarely have good collaboration, but of course, we could still be a little scared.
“It means a lot to win again one of the biggest races of the year in cycling, and I don’t do many races [as yet], so I don’t have a lot of opportunities to win. So it is a lot of pressure for me for today and for days like today, and I am really really happy that we succeeded. I couldn’t be more proud of the team."
In a special moment across the line, Pogacar raised his finger to the sky and ushered a poignant tribute to the former UAE Team Emirates rider, Cristian Camilo Munoz.
The Colombian rider passed away on Friday after a recent crash, and Pogacar paid homage to his former teammate by wearing a black armband throughout Sunday’s race.
