Pogacar’s father believes documentary overlooks crucial part of his son’s success

Speaking to Slovenian media at the premiere of Anatomy of a G.O.A.T. in Ljubljana, Mirko and Marjeta Pogačar reflected on their son's childhood, his approach to losing and the people who have helped him become a five-time Tour de France winner.

The documentary examines Pogačar's metabolism, physiology and remarkable powers of recovery. His parents were impressed, although Mirko felt the film could have explored his personality in greater depth.

“He is special because of his calmness. He's always calm, he never panics,” Mirko said, as reported by Slovenian newspaper Slovenske novice.

“He comes to a race relaxed, focuses on the race, and for him it's really like a game.”

Pogačar's competitive nature was already apparent during family board games, when he regularly found himself trying to beat his two older brothers and older sister.

Losing was never something he enjoyed, although his parents remember that he rarely reacted badly.

“He didn't like losing, but he never reacted badly. He handled it very maturely,” Mirko recalled.

Marjeta remembers how her son would look for different ways to get the better of his siblings, who had the advantage of being older.

“He was always looking for ways to beat us,” she explained. “He constantly had to come up with strategies to beat his older brothers and sister. I think that helps him a lot on the bike now.”

His father also believes the defeats to Jonas Vingegaard at the Tour de France in 2022 and 2023 proved valuable in Pogačar's development.

“I think the Tours he didn't win brought Tadej back down to earth,” Mirko said. “He perhaps lost the first one through his own mistakes, because he hadn't eaten enough and responded to every attack, even when he didn't need to.”

The following year, Pogačar arrived at the Tour having suffered a wrist injury at Liège-Bastogne-Liège, which disrupted his preparation.

“He learned a great deal from those experiences, and that showed at the Tour in the following years,” Mirko added.

Pogačar returned to win the Tour in 2024 and has since taken his total to five victories.

While Mirko wanted to see more about his son's mentality, Marjeta felt another important figure had received too little attention in the documentary.

“Urška plays a big role,” she said, referring to Pogačar's partner and fellow professional cyclist Urška Žigart.

“They really support each other and help each other, looking for ways to prepare and finding food that is good for a cyclist,” Marjeta explained.

The couple's shared profession means they understand each other's training and recovery requirements without having to make the same compromises as partners with different lifestyles.

“I think that is also a very important factor in his success,” she added.

Mirko, meanwhile, would have liked the documentary to explore the differences between Pogačar's former coach Íñigo San Millán and Javier Sola, who replaced him ahead of the 2024 season.

“We've already read a lot about San Millán,” he said, explaining that much less had been revealed about Sola's methods.

“I perhaps missed what the key differences were between the first and second coach.”

Pogačar himself addressed those differences in a separate interview with Eurosport released alongside the documentary, explaining how Sola introduced greater variety into his training, including more VO2 max efforts and race simulations.

The documentary also contained some surprises for Pogačar's parents, particularly the scientific explanations of his physical abilities.

“There were many things that were new to us,” Marjeta admitted after watching the film.

The discussion turned to where their son might have inherited his remarkable metabolism. Marjeta joked about the family's very different abilities when walking uphill.

“Mirko is faster than everyone else, while I'm last,” she said.

After hearing about the maternal inheritance of mitochondria, Marjeta even joked that Tadej might have inherited all of hers, leaving her without his exceptional capacity for recovery.

The family also addressed the serious crash that ended Pogačar's Vuelta a España campaign in August. He suffered a broken collarbone and three fractured vertebrae, injuries that have left his parents concerned about his return to racing.

“I hope this injury hasn't made him afraid of cycling, because that could become a disadvantage in the future,” Marjeta said, as quoted by Eurosport.

Mirko pointed to the potential consequences of the crash after further examinations revealed the additional spinal fractures.

“I think that after the latest diagnosis, Tadej realised just how close he came to the end of his cycling career. If the crash had been just slightly worse, he could have been paralysed.”