Dominant two-time Tour de France winner Tadej Pogacar of the UAE Team Emirates earned his second win of the season on Tuesday by comfortably taking the second stage of the Tour of Catalonia.
Pogacar, who said he “messed up” at the end of Monday’s first stage as he reacted too late to catch Nick Schultz’s sprint to the line, made no such mistake on day two and became the new race leader.
The Slovenian was favourite to triumph in the mountains and after attacking with little more than five kilometres remaining, could not be caught.
Pogacar completed the 186.5km trail from Mataro to Vallter nearly a minute and a half ahead of his closest contenders Mikel Landa and Aleksandr Vlasov, taking control of the general classification.
The 25-year-old made the 11km climb to the finish with an average gradient of nearly eight percent look easy and only seven riders finished within two minutes of him.