UCI Men’s Elite Road Cycling World Championships: Pogačar Makes History on Kigali’s Unforgiving Climbs

KIGALI, Rwanda (September 28, 2025) — There’s something almost cruel about watching greatness unfold in real time. On the cobbled slopes of the Côte de Kimihurura, beneath the unforgiving Rwandan sun, Tadej Pogačar didn’t just win his second consecutive world championship—he dismantled the very notion that anyone else belonged on the same stretch of tarmac.

The 267.5-kilometer odyssey through Rwanda’s “land of a thousand hills” was supposed to be a test of attrition, a brutal examination of who could survive 5,475 meters of elevation gain at altitude. Instead, it became a masterclass in how to make the impossible look inevitable.

The Calm Before the Storm

At the starting line, Pogačar stood “with a smile—lighthearted as a child, ready to chase glory.” The Slovenian’s demeanor betrayed nothing of the violence he would soon unleash upon the field. Around him, the peloton bristled with nervous energy, 267 riders preparing for what many would later describe as one of the most demanding races of their careers.

The early exchanges played out with the familiar choreography of a grand tour stage, though the script was being rewritten from the opening kilometers. Red Walters of Grenada took the first tentative stab at glory, his attack immediately drawing interest from the Continental squad riders hungry for television time. Menno Huising from the Dutch team gave chase, quickly joined by Germany’s Marius Mayrhofer and Portugal’s Ivo Oliveira—a trio of seasoned campaigners who understood the value of patience over panic.

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As the cobbled Côte de Kimihurura announced itself for the first time, Denmark’s Anders Foldager and Switzerland’s Fabio Christen bridged across, creating a formidable six-man alliance. France’s Julien Bernard, ever the opportunist, made it seven after three laps of increasingly aggressive racing, his move coming as the peloton began to show the first signs of the day’s selective nature.

But even as the break established itself, shadows began to fall across the race with ominous frequency. The first major casualty came via a crash involving several big nations—Belgium’s Ilan Van Wilder, bronze medallist in the previous Sunday’s time trial, found himself eliminated from contention alongside Spain’s Marc Soler. Britain’s Bjorn Koerdt initially remounted but soon abandoned, his hopes extinguished as quickly as they had been kindled.

More ominously, two-time world champion Julian Alaphilippe launched one of his trademark accelerations, bridging to Mongolia’s Tegsh-Bayar Batsaikhan before the peloton’s collective anxiety brought them back. But the Frenchman’s erratic behavior—aggressive one moment, dropping out the back the next—suggested all was not well. His early withdrawal due to illness proved a portent of the carnage to come, as France’s team strength ebbed with Louis Barré also abandoning, their roster reduced from nine to seven before the real racing had even begun.

The Crucible of Mont Kigali

For 160 kilometers, the race followed a deceptively controlled script. Slovenia and Belgium shared the pacemaking duties like negotiating partners, content to let the break dangle at a manageable two-and-a-half minute distance. Behind them, the peloton began to hemorrhage riders with alarming regularity—Georg Zimmermann laboring on the cobbles, Luke Plapp surprisingly distanced despite his climbing pedigree, Will Barta abandoning after his early work for the USA.

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Rwanda’s Eric Manizabayo provided moments of local theater, launching a series of attacks that delighted the roadside crowds. His desperate bid to join the leaders spoke to something deeper than mere patriotism—this was a rider seizing his moment on cycling’s biggest stage, knowing such opportunities might never come again.

But as the riders approached Mont Kigali—the day’s longest and steepest ascent at 5.9 kilometers averaging 6.7 percent—the atmosphere shifted perceptibly. Teams began positioning themselves with the urgency of generals preparing for battle.

Florian Vermeersch, Belgium’s workhorse, finally succumbed to the accumulated strain, his day’s work complete. It was a small sign of what was to come—even the strongest domestiques were reaching their limits.

The breakaway, meanwhile, had begun its own process of natural selection. Biniam Girmay, the African star who had publicly lamented the route’s climbing bias, was among the first casualties as gradients bit deep into legs already softened by altitude and humidity. More riders fell away with each pedal stroke, including Slovenia’s Luka Mezgec, reducing Pogačar’s support network just as he would need it most.

Then, with the casual brutality that has become his trademark, Pogačar moved to the front and began to turn the screws. Among the fallen was Remco Evenepoel, the time trial world champion who had dominated the Slovenian just days earlier. The sight of the rainbow jersey contender sliding backwards through the field carried the weight of prophecy. Even more ominous was his body language—mechanical issues that would prove to be the first of several that would define his day.

Behind them, Richard Carapaz briefly tried to follow the move before he too was spat out the back, leaving only Juan Ayuso clinging to Pogačar’s wheel as they crested the summit. The peloton, suddenly robbed of its favorites, could only watch as the race’s destiny was rewritten in real time.

The Dance of Destruction

What followed was a clinic in controlled violence, though the opening moves betrayed little of the chaos to come. Juan Ayuso clung to Pogačar’s wheel as they crested Mont Kigali, the young Spaniard’s face already betraying the strain of matching the Slovenian’s tempo. Behind them, Isaac Del Toro—the Mexican prodigy whose Giro d’Italia performances had marked him as a future grand tour contender—bridged across on the technical descent, his fearless descending bringing three UAE Emirates riders together at the vanguard of cycling’s most prestigious one-day race.

The irony was not lost on observers: three teammates, representing three different nations, suddenly finding themselves in perfect position to control the world’s most important one-day race. But this was merely the overture to what would become a symphony of suffering.

As they hit the Mur de Kigali—that 400-meter strip of cobbled hell averaging a leg-breaking 11 percent—the gradients began their own process of selection. The crowds here were enormous, their energy providing a stark contrast to the private agony being played out on the climb. Ayuso, his Tour de France pedigree no match for the accumulated fatigue and altitude, finally cracked, leaving Pogačar and Del Toro to dance alone at the front.

Behind them, chaos reigned. A chase group of ten riders formed, desperately trying to limit their losses, but Evenepoel was conspicuously absent. The Belgian found himself marooned in a second group, his mechanical issues having cost him precious positioning at the crucial moment. Even more significantly, he wasn’t even the leading Belgian rider—that honor belonged to Cian Uijtdebroeks, trapped in the first chase group and unable to provide the support Evenepoel would desperately need.

The psychological impact of this reversal cannot be overstated. Evenepoel had arrived in Rwanda with the confidence of a man who had just demolished the field in the time trial, delivering Pogačar one of his most humbling defeats. Now, less than a week later, he found himself chasing desperately as his world championship dreams began to unravel on the very roads where he had hoped to complete a historic double.

For 30 kilometers, this unlikely duo worked in harmony, their collaboration born of necessity rather than friendship. Del Toro, despite his youth and relative inexperience at this level, matched Pogačar pedal stroke for pedal stroke, their lead stretching steadily toward a minute as chaos erupted behind them.

The Mexican’s presence at the front represented more than mere opportunism. His brilliant riding at the Giro earlier in the year had marked him as a genuine future contender, but his team’s limitations—just two domestiques to support him, one of whom, David Ruvalcaba, had already abandoned—meant this might be his only realistic chance at rainbow jersey glory. The sight of the young climber trading pulls with the world’s best rider carried its own poetic justice.

But if Del Toro was writing his own fairy tale, Evenepoel was living through a nightmare of mechanical failures and mounting frustration. “Frantically putting his arm up in the air for attention, wanting to sort out his latest bike problem,” the Belgian’s day was unraveling in the most public manner possible. Despite having changed bikes earlier, he remained “not a happy bunny,” giving “his handlebars a real bash, clearly not content with his bike.”

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When his team car finally arrived, he was seen “kicking something on the ground while he waits,” the image of a champion’s frustration laid bare for the world to see. The mechanical delay cost him precious seconds and, more importantly, left him marooned with “a few riders with him, but getting no assistance from any of them.”

Meanwhile, Victor Campanaerts, one of Evenepoel’s key domestiques and the man whose Tour de France work for Jonas Vingegaard had earned widespread praise, abandoned the race. His departure represented another nail in the coffin of Belgian hopes, leaving Evenepoel increasingly isolated just as the race entered its most critical phase.

The contrast with Pogačar’s serene progress at the front could not have been more stark. While Evenepoel battled equipment failures and isolation, the Slovenian appeared to glide over the terrain with metronomic precision, his partnership with Del Toro extending their advantage with each passing kilometer.

The Point of No Return

The decisive moment came with 67 kilometers remaining, on the cobbled slopes of Kimihurura where Pogačar had been practicing his trade all morning. Del Toro, the young Mexican who had ridden so brilliantly at the Giro earlier in the year, finally succumbed to the relentless pace.

“Del Toro’s been dropped again, and this time Pogačar isn’t waiting!”

What followed was 60 kilometers of solitary suffering—not for Pogačar, who appeared to glide over the terrain with metronomic precision, but for everyone else. Behind him, the race for the minor medals played out with its own desperate intensity.

Evenepoel, having overcome his mechanical demons, launched a series of attacks that would have broken lesser riders. On the Côte de Kimihurura, with 21 kilometers remaining, he finally managed to distance Denmark’s Mattias Skjelmose and Ireland’s Ben Healy, but by then it was far too late.

The Reckoning

As Pogačar entered the final kilometers, the numbers told their own story. Of 267 starters, only 30 would see the finish line. The man at the front led by more than a minute, his advantage growing with each pedal stroke.

“I was alone quite early, and I was fighting with myself like last year,” he would later reflect. “I’m so happy I made it. For sure, I doubted. The climbs were getting harder and harder every lap. The final laps were so hard… But you have to push through and hope for the best.”

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The final kilometer was a procession. Pogačar crossed the line with arms aloft, his second consecutive rainbow jersey secured with a margin of 1:32 over Evenepoel. Healy completed the podium, delivering Ireland its first elite men’s road race medal since Sean Kelly in 1989.

Tom Pidcock, finishing more than five minutes down, perhaps captured the day best: describing it as “the most unenjoyable race of the year” due to its sheer difficulty.

The Weight of History

In claiming victory, Pogačar achieved something that had eluded even Eddy Merckx: back-to-back Tour de France and world championship doubles. The Slovenian’s dominance across multiple terrains and disciplines has reached a level that transcends simple excellence, entering the realm of the historical.

“On the Mur de Kigali, he danced away, writing his own tale—stroke after stroke, turn after turn—until the final, glorious salute. His black Colnago Y1Rs, silent and sleek, was his companion for a 60km flight into legend.”

This was not merely a victory; it was a statement of intent from a rider who has redefined what’s possible in professional cycling. In the land of a thousand hills, Pogačar climbed them all, leaving his rivals to wonder not if they could catch him, but whether anyone ever will.

Results

Only 30 of 267 starters finished the 267.5km race featuring 5,475m of elevation gain.