Majka storms to success at the Tour of Slovenia

The Tour of Slovenia 2022 starts in the best way for the UAE Team Emirates: Rafal Majka won in the inaugural stage (Nova Gorica-Postojna of 164.7 km), ahead of Domen Novak (Bahrain-Victorious) and teammate Tadej Pogačar.

The trio made the decisive move with 59 km left: an attack by the two-time winner of the Tour de France on the slopes of the Zadlog climb (2nd category, 4.7 km at 7.4% average gradient) gave life to the trio of attackers, chased for a long time without success by Matej Mohoric (Bahrain-Victorious) and Sean Bennett (China Glory).

In the final, perfect teamwork allowed Majka to take his first win of the season (26th for UAE Team Emirates), while Pogačar crossed the line in 3rd place.
The first group of pursuers finished the stage 48 seconds behind Majka.

Majka: “We were a bit surprised the action kicked off from so far out.
On the 2nd category climb, the pace went up a lot and Tadej asked to accelerate, we shelled out the group and then went off on the attack. We managed to get to the finish line: it was a long breakaway, but we had good legs thanks to the good training we did in Livigno. I thank the whole team for their trust and support, with a special mention for Tadej: as always, he was the strongest today too, but he told me I could try to win.
I am happy with the result, now we will concentrate to look for new stage successes and to support Pogačar in the general classification ”.

Pogačar: “It was a demanding stage, also due to the heat. The race exploded uphill under the strong pace of Bahrain-Victorious: at that point, Majka, Novak and were in the lead of the race.
I worked hard with Rafal to make sure we made it to the line. In the last kilometers we were all close to limit, I tried a stretch and Novak finished, at which point Majka launched the winning attack.
I am very happy for my teammates success and for the fact that tomorrow he will be able to wear the leaders jersey.
For the first day in this Tour de Slovenia, we could not have asked for better, we will continue to fight in the next stages as well ”.

With the race leader’s jersey on his shoulders, the Polish climber will face the 2nd stage taking the group from Ptuj to Roganska Slatina (174.2 km without particular altitude difficulties).
Stage 1 results

1. Rafal Majka (UAE Team Emirates) 4:02:10
2. Domen Novak (Bahrain-Victorious) +2 ”
3. Tadej Pogačar (UAE Team Emirates) s.t.

General classification after stage 1

1. Rafal Majka (UAE Team Emirates) 4:02:00
2. Domen Novak (Bahrain-Victorious) +6 ”
3. Tadej Pogačar (UAE Team Emirates) +8 “