There are few courses that don\u2019t suit Slovenian super-cyclist Tadej Poga\u010dar. Not even Milan-San Remo. Only the cobbles of Paris-Roubaix are proving troublesome for King Pog.<\/p>\n
So maybe the Slovenian organizing committee of the 2026 European road championships had some excuse when it revealed a set of parcours for this October that will have Poga\u010dar purring with pleasure.<\/p>\n
The men\u2019s road race out of Ljubljana features repeated ascents of the Mo\u017ejanca climb. The 2km kicker averages 10 percent and ramps up to 15 percent.<\/p>\n
The 196km parcours looks like Li\u00e8ge-Bastogne-Li\u00e8ge or maybe Il Lombardia, only easier. As a reminder, Poga\u010dar has won those two monuments a total of nine times.<\/p>\n
The 130km women\u2019s road race is also centered on the Mo\u017ejanca. The men lap the climb five times, the women two times.<\/p>\n
Both men\u2019s and women\u2019s elite races this October finish in \u0160en\u010dur, a short hop outside of Ljubljana, and just down the road from Poga\u010dar\u2019s hometown of Klanec.<\/p>\n
Poga\u010dar reportedly even had a hand in designing courses that navigate his OG training territory.<\/p>\n
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Slovenia hosts European championship for the first time<\/h2>\nPoga\u010dar and Zigart are a celebrity supercouple at home in Slovenia.<\/span> (Photo: Massimo Insabato\/Archivio Massimo Insabato\/Mondadori Portfolio via Getty Images)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
2026 will be the first time Slovenia has hosted the European championships. The nation is also bidding to host the grand d\u00e9part<\/em> of the 2029 Tour de France.<\/p>\n
Some may say it\u2019s about time given riders like Poga\u010dar, Primo\u017e Rogli\u010d, Urksa Zigart, and Matej Mohori\u010d have driven the narrative for years.<\/p>\n
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It\u2019s understood that Poga\u010dar intends to defend the European title he won over Remco Evenepoel and Paul Seixas last year in France.<\/p>\n
However, scheduling is tricky for Poga\u010dar and the entire European peloton.<\/p>\n
The women\u2019s and men\u2019s road races on October 2 and 3 are just one week after the world championship road races on the other side of the Atlantic in Montr\u00e9al. Being the modern Cannibal, Poga\u010dar wants to win both titles (again).<\/p>\n
Officials said Monday they deliberately drew a set of parcours near the national Ljubljana airport to ease some travel concerns.<\/p>\n
Local broadcaster RTVSlo<\/span><\/em> has described the European championships as \u201cthe largest cycling event in the history of Slovenia and one of the biggest sporting events of the year in our country.\u201d<\/p>\n
Slovenian officials are pulling out all the stops to ensure Poga\u010dar will be at the start line \u2013 and maybe on the podium at the finish line, too.<\/p>\n
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European road championship schedule 2026<\/h2>\n
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Women\u2019s elite road race (130km): October 3<\/li>\n
Men\u2019s elite road race (196km): October 4<\/li>\n
Women\u2019s and men\u2019s elite TT (both 22km): October 7<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
[analyse_image type=”featured” src=”https:\/\/velo-cdn.outsideonline.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/GettyImages-2174705030-2.jpg”] Jim Cotton Updated May 19, 2026 02:00AM There are few courses that don\u2019t suit Slovenian super-cyclist Tadej Poga\u010dar. Not even Milan-San Remo. Only the cobbles of Paris-Roubaix are proving troublesome for King Pog. So maybe the Slovenian organizing committee of the 2026 European road championships had some excuse when it revealed a […]<\/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-1943190","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\/1943190","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=1943190"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1943190\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1943190"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1943190"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1943190"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
![\"Pogacar](\"https:\/\/velo-cdn.outsideonline.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/GettyImages-2204494695.jpg?width=2048&auto=webp&quality=75&fit=cover\")
![](\"https:\/\/velo-cdn.outsideonline.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/Parcours-1-1200x1697.jpeg?width=3840&auto=webp&quality=75&fit=cover\")
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