Tadej Poga\u010dar did not win Tuesday\u2019s opening prologue at the Tour de Romandie in what\u2019s a curious footnote in his otherwise near-flawless 2026 campaign.<\/p>\n
Somewhat surprisingly, it was Poga\u010dar\u2019s first prologue as a professional to open the six-day Romandie tour that\u2019s financially on the ropes.<\/p>\n
\u201cFirst prologue in my professional career,\u201d Poga\u010dar said as he cooled down after the 3.2km effort. \u201cThat was hard on the legs.\u201d<\/p>\n
The world No. 1 \u2014 not racing in his road world champion stripes in the effort against the clock \u2014 clearly was not taking chances Tuesday on the short, damp, and technical course.<\/p>\n
The GC is what Poga\u010dar is aiming for, and there are plenty of chances in the rolling profile from here to Sunday for him to blast away.<\/p>\n
Wednesday\u2019s stage 1 features a Cat. 1 climb of 8.9km at 9.8 percent in the final hour of the route, so the UAE king could bound away to take control of one of the few stage races missing on his palmar\u00e8s<\/em>.<\/p>\n For Poga\u010dar, Tuesday\u2019s sixth place was only the second race day he\u2019s \u201clost\u201d in 2026.<\/p>\n His other was second to Wout van Aert at an apocalyptic edition of Paris-Roubaix. He is otherwise near-perfect this season, with massive victories at Strade Bianche, Milan-San Remo, Tour of Flanders, and Li\u00e8ge-Bastogne-Li\u00e8ge.<\/p>\n Also Tuesday, Poga\u010dar rolled out a new time trial setup, debuting a prototype of a TT2 bike expected to be raced at the Tour de France, HLN<\/em> reported.<\/p>\n The Italian brand said the new configuration is 550 grams lighter, proof that Poga\u010dar is very much shifting the focus toward what would be a record-tying fifth yellow jersey if he wins in July.<\/p>\n Dorian Godon\u00a0(Ineos Grenadiers) won the rare prologue to secure a leader\u2019s jersey without a title sponsor.<\/p>\n \u201cTime trials of 20, 30, or 40 kilometers shouldn\u2019t be the only ones. I really love these kinds of explosive efforts. I took the corners flat out and took some risks,\u201d the Frenchman told L\u2019Equipe<\/em>. \u201cAlso, I am very happy to wear the yellow jersey. It has been a super year for me so far.\u201d<\/p>\n Prologues were once a staple of stage racing, but have largely disappeared from the WorldTour calendar.<\/p>\n That\u2019s why Poga\u010dar never raced one as a pro.<\/p>\n The Tour de France abandoned them about a decade ago as ASO shifted toward traditional road stages to award the first yellow jersey.<\/p>\n The 13.2km individual time trial to open the 2022 Tour in Copenhagen was as close to a prologue as the Tour\u2019s come in a while. Anything above 8km is usually classified as an individual time trial.<\/p>\n Tour\u2019s last old school, short-distance prologue was 2012 in Li\u00e8ge, won by Fabian Cancellara at 6.4km.<\/p>\n This year\u2019s grand d\u00e9part<\/em> in Barcelona opens with a team time trial, another rarity, but there is little indication the classic prologue format is set for a broader return.<\/p>\n Poga\u010dar\u2019s presence this week will give the beleaguered Tour de Romandie a boost.<\/p>\n The long-running Swiss race \u2014 dating back to the 1940s \u2014 is facing a financial crunch.<\/p>\n There\u2019s no paying sponsor for its yellow jersey this week, and though there is money in the bank to run the 2027 edition, there\u2019s some fear about the future of one of Europe\u2019s historical stage races.<\/p>\n The race starts this week on life support just as the Tour de Suisse \u2014 long considered cycling\u2019s \u201cfourth grand tour\u201d \u2014 is being trimmed from eight to five stages in June.<\/p>\n Only 15 teams are at the start line this week after four WorldTour teams opted out of starting, as UCI rules allow. Decathlon-CMA CGM, Alpecin-Premier Tech, Lotto-Intermarch\u00e9 and Uno-X did not start.<\/p>\n NSN and EF Education-EasyPost each started with only six riders each, and the entire peloton is a threadbare 103 racers.<\/p>\n The presence of Poga\u010dar will have the race a boost. He\u2019s racing here and at the Tour de Suisse this summer as he streamlined his 2026 racing calendar to put a heavy emphasis on the spring monument season.<\/p>\n Along with riders like Lenny Martinez (Bahrain-Victorious), Valentin Paret-Peintre (Soudal-Quick Step), and Florian Lipowitz and Primo\u017e Rogli\u010d (Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe), the Romandie star power is actually greater than what the Giro d\u2019Italia will likely see next month.<\/p>\n Americans have had success here, with Tyler Hamilton winning it twice, Matteo Jorgenson second in 2023, and Andrew Hampsten a winner in 1992.<\/p>\n This week, Andrew August (Ineos Grenadiers), Kevin Vermaerke (UAE Team Emirates-XRG), and Sean Quinn (EF Education-EasyPost) are racing.<\/p>\n Dating back to 1947, such luminaries as Gino Bartali, Hugo Koblet, Bernard Hinault, Stephen Roche, and Eddy Merckx have won it.<\/p>\n [analyse_source url=”https:\/\/velo.outsideonline.com\/road\/road-racing\/pogacar-first-prologue-loss-romandie-future-uncertain\/”]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" [analyse_image type=”featured” src=”https:\/\/velo-cdn.outsideonline.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/POGhoriz.jpg”] Andrew Hood Updated April 29, 2026 03:46AM Tadej Poga\u010dar did not win Tuesday\u2019s opening prologue at the Tour de Romandie in what\u2019s a curious footnote in his otherwise near-flawless 2026 campaign. Somewhat surprisingly, it was Poga\u010dar\u2019s first prologue as a professional to open the six-day Romandie tour that\u2019s financially on the ropes. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[226,71],"class_list":["post-1908738","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-politics","tag-crawlmanager","tag-velo-outsideonline-com"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1908738","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1908738"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1908738\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1908738"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1908738"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1908738"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}Prologues a dying breed<\/h2>\n
Romandie on the ropes<\/h2>\n
Results: Tour de Romandie prologue<\/h2>\n\n<\/div>\n