Tadej Pogačar said a mid-race outburst at Jonas Vingegaard during last year's Tour de France was "in the heat of the moment" and "something he didn't actually mean".
In an episode of Netflix's latest season of Tour de France: Unchained, released on Wednesday, Pogačar is captioned as yelling "f*** you" at Vingegaard during the gravel stage of 2024's edition. The moment came after the Dane appeared to refuse to pull on the front of an attacking trio, which also contained Remco Evenepoel.
Speaking in Lille ahead of this year's Grand Départ, Pogačar said the incident picked up by Netflix was "a normal thing in the sport", rather than a sign of hostility between the two rivals.
"It's not nice to flip off at someone," he said. "But in all sports, I think it's easy to sometimes say something in the heat of the moment that you might regret after… A lot of guys say bad things in the peloton when it’s so stressful, it just happens, it's a normal thing in the sport.
"There’s also been a lot of tension in the past years between my team, UAE, and Visma. When you compete for the biggest race there will of course be tension but we have big respect towards each other, too.
“When you finish a stage you congratulate each other regardless of what happened on the road. That's the beauty of sport in a way, you've left it all out on the field, you're a competitor, but you cross the line and then you show respect to each other afterwards, normally that’s the case."
Confident and ready
Pogačar and Vingegaard's supremacy has defined much of the last five years of professional racing, with the Tour's yellow jersey passed back and forth between them since 2020.
Pogačar, who goes into this month's Tour as the outright favourite for victory, called the rivalry "intense", acknowledging that it provided a great spectacle for fans each July.
"It will be interesting to see whether we exchange the title again or not," he said. "Maybe one of the new guys can surprise us a little bit.
"A lot can happen in such a long race but I'm looking forward to racing against Jonas again, he's in great shape. I think it will be a great month for people in front of the TV and beside the road as well."
Asked what he felt Vingegaard was better than him at, the world champion said: "I think Jonas is the best climber in the world over the last few years. On long climbs he's one of the best, if not the best, sometimes his time trials are better than me, too. We'll see during this Tour where I can be better."
Fans might see that difference as early as the first few punchy stages, which are likely to bring a Classics style of racing. Such terrain has historically suited riders like Mathieu van der Poel (Alpecin-Deceuninck) and Wout van Aert (Visma-Lease a Bike), but as Pogačar's six stage wins last time round show, he's determined to make a difference whenever he can.
"As always the first week of the Tour is one of the most intense and nervous weeks," he said. "You can quite easily lose the race in the first 10 days to the first rest day.
"But I also see the opportunity though, the hard finishes and tricky finals, not so many pure sprint stages. I don't think my aim should be to gain time, but the first week you just need to take care and not screw things up completely… I'm confident and ready."
