Chapter Text
Dear Diary,
I am a professional athlete.
Whether I like the label or not, I am one of the Tour favorites.
But today, I felt like I was just pretending.
I know my ambition, my dream to win the Tour again, comes at a price.
Often, that price is loneliness. Today, it was the opposite. Attention. The unwanted kind.
The team presentation.
I don’t like this part.
Standing on a stage in front of a crowd of strangers, music blaring, a sea of cameras everywhere. People shouting your name like they know you. They cheer, they wave flags, they smile.
I smile back.
Of course I do. That’s the job. But it’s never felt natural.
Never will.
I should be used to it by now.
Almost five years in this sport feel like an eternity.
I’ve dealt with so many stages in my career.
And I don’t just mean the ones we race on. But the Tour de France always feels different.
Especially when it’s a round stage like today…
Who comes up with that stuff?! I felt like I was doing laps in a circus.
The rest of the guys seemed fine.
Like they’ve done this a hundred times - which, I guess, we all have. And still, my throat closed up right before I biked out.
Heart hammering. Legs heavy.
Not even a minute before, someone shoved a mic in my hand, like I was supposed to say something clever. Or worse - funny.
I managed a few words.
Definitely no jokes, more like vague platitudes about how happy I am to be here.
Everyone knew I meant the Tour - but DEFINITELY NOT that stage.
I could hardly understand the hosts, the crowd was too loud. The noise kept growing - What were they shouting??
I hope no one saw how thrown off I was, yet have I been so lucky rarely.
I spiraled but of course they weren’t booing me,
they were just waiting for him.
Tadej.
You could feel it, the buzzing energy in the air. A mix between low humming and full-on chanting.
In the middle of the crowd, I noticed a little girl.
Dressed head to toe in UAE merch, holding up a cardboard sign that said “Pogi is my Hero.”
And honestly, I get it. I really do.
As I rode down the ramp, our gazes locked briefly. Just for a moment.
I couldn’t see his eyes behind those mirrored glasses but he nodded at me.
Silently greeted me for our next dance on this stage that, not just today, belongs to him.
Later I watched a clip of his entrance.
He grinned - wide and careless - the way only he can.
He’s in white and black. UAE’s kit always looks good on him, unfortunately even better with those rainbow stripes on it - and his hair’s probably a little shorter than last year.
I can’t say for sure, because he wore that awful bucket hat the Tour gave all of us riders.
But of course he made even that ridiculous piece of clothing look effortlessly cool. Wout laughed at me for several minutes after I tried on mine backstage…
Tadej spoke French first, just a few phrases.
It was enough to win over the crowd.
As if he even needed to.
He joked with them and the presenter. Always relaxed, ever his playful self.
I try not to smile while watching it.
I failed.
It used to annoy me.
How easy everything looked for him.
How he never seems to need to be serious.
Now I don’t know what it is.
Admiration, maybe.
Or something else I don’t want to admit.
“We have to wait and see,” he said during the press conference about my form for the Tour.
There are moments when I’m sure he sees right through me.
Usually, I hope he doesn’t.
But sometimes, I beg he does .
~ Jonas