By Big Ring Editorial Staff · The Big Ring Report
Tadej Pogačar arrived in Sanremo on Saturday having won every Monument except one. He left having won them all.
La Classicissima, 288 kilometres from Milan to the Via Roma and the longest single-day race on the calendar, was the last item on a checklist that most riders spend entire careers trying to complete. Pogačar completed it at 26, in the rain, after crashing before the Cipressa, and then soloing clear of the best classics riders in the world on the Poggio. He then told reporters he might never come back. That is either the most Pogačar thing imaginable, or the most honest thing any champion has said about this race in years.
**How it happened**
UAE Team Emirates set a relentless tempo throughout the final 60 kilometres, burning off the opportunists and reducing the race to its familiar cast of characters: Pogačar, Van der Poel, Van Aert, Pidcock. The decisive move came on the Poggio, where Pogačar launched a sustained acceleration rather than his customary explosive long-range attack. It was a tactical evolution that has been visible across his recent Monument performances. Pidcock was the only rider able to follow briefly. Nobody else came close.
Brandon McNulty deserves particular mention. He crashed with 30 kilometres to go, bridged back to the front group, and then continued to drive the pace for his leader. His post-race comment that it was "repayment" for Pogačar's support at the Montreal World Cup last year says something about the culture inside UAE Team Emirates that the results alone do not fully capture.
Pogačar crossed the line alone, 28 seconds ahead of Tom Pidcock and Filippo Ganna. Wout van Aert, racing with minimal preparation after illness disrupted his spring, somehow salvaged a podium after his own crash. Mathieu van der Poel, the defending champion, finished eighth and later revealed he had been racing with a hip and knee injury sustained in a crash earlier in the day that left him unable to properly grip his handlebars on descents. That he finished at all is remarkable. That he finished eighth is absurd.
**The Monument collection is complete**
This was the one that had eluded him. Pogačar had won Liège-Bastogne-Liège twice, Il Lombardia three times, and the Tour of Flanders. San Remo, with its specific demands including the length, the technical descents, and the sprint-or-attack dilemma on the Poggio, had always neutralised his most aggressive instincts. Previous attempts saw him isolated or outmaneuvered in the finale. This year, patience won where power alone had not.
The post-race comment that he might not return, that the race is "too long, too stressful," is worth taking seriously. Pogačar has Paris-Roubaix still to win if he wants to complete the full Monument set. San Remo, now conquered, may simply move down the priority list. A rider who can win it once and walk away is either supremely confident or supremely exhausted. Possibly both.
**The women's race: Kopecky, again**
Lotte Kopecky won the women's Milan-San Remo for the third consecutive year, with SD Worx-Protime executing a textbook tactical race. Elise Chabbey sacrificed her own ambitions to set up Kopecky on the Poggio, while Lorena Wiebes, a pure sprinter who would have been the favourite in a bunch finish, accepted her role without complaint. The result was never really in doubt once the Poggio selection was made.
The race was overshadowed by a serious crash on the Cipressa descent involving Kasia Niewiadoma-Phinney and Debora Silvestri. Silvestri sustained five broken ribs and a fractured shoulder blade. Niewiadoma-Phinney finished the race but later confirmed a fractured rib and bruised lung, injuries that will now complicate her preparation for the Ardennes, where she is typically one of the strongest contenders.
**What comes next**
The cobbled classics begin in earnest next weekend. Van der Poel's injury status is the central question. His ability to grip the bars on the Roubaix cobbles will matter considerably more than it did on the Poggio. Van Aert, despite the compromised preparation, showed enough at San Remo to suggest he is rounding into form at the right time. Pogačar has not confirmed his Roubaix plans, but the arithmetic is obvious: it is the one Monument he has not won.
The spring is just getting started.