It's become a familiar sight over the past few years: Tadej Pogačar, riding solo ahead of a pursuing peloton. He sits upright, looking comfortable in his two-minute lead. He takes a bidon, scratches his back, bunny hops a speed bump. He takes the last climb — 1.2 kilometres at almost 10 per cent — in the big ring. Why not?

This is the world champion's first Tour de Suisse. Before yesterday's start, he had already secured nine victories from his 11 race days this year. At his last race, the Tour de Romandie, he had claimed four out of five stages, as well as the overall win. The question, therefore, was not who would win the Tour de Suisse — but whether anyone would be able to beat Pogačar at all.

This year's shortened Tour de Suisse — five days, rather than eight — scrapped its prologue and began at the deep end, with a 144-kilometre loop around the Italian alpine city of Sondrio, close to the Swiss border. Punctuated by short, sharp hills, the stage featured almost 2,500 metres of elevation gain.

On terrain that suited him, it quickly became clear that Pogačar wasn't messing around. No bonuses for his teammates, no sitting back, no reserve. 73 kilometres from the finish, he decided on a whim to contest the second intermediate sprint, gaining two bonus seconds behind breakaway rider Fredrik Dversnes (Uno-X Mobility) and keeping the pace so high that he had soon splintered the peloton, left teammate Brandon McNulty behind, caught Dversnes and gone solo. With 70 kilometres to go.

"I took the bonus seconds, and afterwards me and Brandon looked at each other and said: 'Let's go.' We tried something, and from then on, we just went," he said in an interview after the stage. "This was definitely not the plan, but somehow it worked."

Raising his hands in the air, Pogačar crossed the finish line with two minutes and 14 seconds' advantage over Richard Carapaz (EF Education-EasyPost), who had spurned the chasing group early on to pursue Pogačar alone. Behind him, puncheur Andrea Bagioli (Lidl-Trek) completed the day's podium, having pulled a similar move later in the race.

Key contenders

Carapaz's gutsy second place is a promising indication of his form ahead of the Tour de France. We've not seen much of the Ecuadorian rider this year: he finished 10th at Volta Ciclista a Catalunya in March and 18th at Tirreno-Adriatico. After a gnarly sounding surgery to remove a perineal cyst, Carapaz withdrew from the Giro to focus on preparations for the Tour. Carapaz won the Tour de Suisse in 2021, and a podium place is clearly the aim here.

With Tour de France protagonists like Paul Seixas, Juan Ayuso, Ben Healy, Tobias Johannessen and Isaac del Toro all opting for the Tour Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes in preparation, the Tour de Suisse startlist is full of veteran riders. Think Julian Alaphilippe (Tudor Pro Cycling), Primož Roglič (Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe), Mikel Landa (Soudal Quick-Step), Enric Mas (Movistar) and teammate Nairo Quintana. Tom Pidcock, meanwhile, who may have been able to challenge Pogačar, withdrew from the race due to an infection.

Neither Roglič nor Mas are going to the Tour this year — so don't necessarily need to hold anything back here, although Roglič is likely to target a record-breaking fifth Vuelta win later in the year. Surprisingly for a man who has won all the other one-week stage races, this is the 36-year-old's first Tour de Suisse. "It was time," he said before the race. Roglič is still in contention for a stage win, but what chances he had of an overall victory are rapidly evaporating: he was dropped from the chasing group yesterday and finished four minutes and 40 seconds down on Pogačar.

Bahrain-Victorious' GC hopes in Antonio Tiberi will also have faded after yesterday. The 24-year-old was dropped on the first climb, Buglio in Monte, and lost more than 20 minutes to Pogačar. It may create opportunities for teammate Lenny Martinez, who won the youth classification at Romandie and Catalunya this year, finishing on the podium in both races, and beat Jonas Vingegaard to claim a stage of Paris-Nice. Martinez now sits 13 minutes behind Pogačar in GC.

With Pogačar already carving out a solid lead, there's also a chance that other members of UAE Team Emirates-XRG's squad will be let off the leash. McNulty, Felix Großschartner and Jhonatan Narváez all finished in the top 10 yesterday, with today's stage potentially favouring the latter.

The route

The five stages of this year's Tour de Suisse visit the Italian, German and French-speaking regions of Switzerland, with the start and finish of each stage always in the same place. The race is shorter, but there's not much respite.

Stages two and three provide the best opportunities for the Classics riders and the few sprinters in the bunch — but that's not to say that they are flat. Stage two, with 2,110 metres of climbing, is likely to be decided on the two short, steep climbs close to the finale. Mathieu van der Poel, who has re-emerged for the first time on the road since Paris-Roubaix, declared his intentions to target a stage win earlier in the day. "It's not going to be easy," he said. "The stages are quite short, so the racing will be intense, and I'm looking forward to it." Could today be the day?

While sprinters who can survive the climbs have a shot at stage two, stage three offers the best opportunity for the fast men. There are still two demanding categorised climbs, but the final 60 kilometres are flat, giving well-organised teams the opportunity to bring their sprinters back. With Jasper Philipsen having swapped Tour de Suisse for the Baloise Belgium Tour at the last minute, such opportunities are likely to fall to riders like Kaden Groves (Alpecin-Premier Tech), Matthew Brennan (Visma-Lease a Bike), Alberto Dainese (Soudal Quick-Step) or Marijn van den Berg (EF Education-EasyPost).

The 23.8-kilometre time trial on Saturday is the race's flattest stage, which may give the time triallists an advantage over Pogačar. Two-time French national ITT champion Rémi Cavagna (Groupama-FDJ United) and Ilan van Wilder (Soudal Quick-Step), who beat Pogačar in last year's ITT World Championships, are both in with a shout. And don't forget Alec Segaert (Bahrain-Victorious), who holds numerous under-23 ITT titles, and even Sjoerd Bax (Pinarello Q36.5 Pro Cycling Team), who finished fourth behind Cavagna at the Giro's ITT.

The race culminates in a tough final mountain stage, with three ascents of the 19.6-kilometre Col de la Croix and over 4,000 metres of elevation gain. The stage concludes with an uphill finish into Villars-sur-Ollon. No surprises who this might suit.

Prediction

With a two-minute lead after stage one, it seems inevitable that Pogačar will win his first Tour de Suisse. But races like these, taken in preparation for the Tour, are a balancing act. Seixas and Oscar Onley's (Picnic PostNL) crashes during the Tour Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes highlight the pitfalls of racing so close to the Tour. How much risk do you take? How deep do you go? Now that Pogačar has asserted his authority, will he keep his powder dry — or continue to blow the race apart?