Slovenia's cycling superstar named Champion of Champions

Slovenia's cycling superstar Tadej Pogačar, the winner of several grand tours, including four Tour de France titles, and two world championship titles, has been declared the Champion of Champions 2025 by L'Equipe, the legendary French sports newspaper that launched the Tour de France in 1903.

Canadian swimmer Summer McIntosh won among women athletes, CE Report quotes The Slovenia Times.

This is the first Champion of Champions title for Pogačar, who received his third Velo d'Or, the top award in cycling, earlier this month.

L'Equipe has been honouring top athletes with the Champion of Champions title for decades. The winners are selected in a secret vote by the daily's editorial teams. Pogačar, 27, has become only the second cyclist to win the title after Greg LeMond in 1989.

Coming third in 2024, this year Pogačar impressed the journalists with his fourth Tour de France victory and wins at three Monuments: the Tour of Flanders, Giro di Lombardia and Liege-Bastogne-Liege, L'Equipe said. The five Monuments are considered the most prestigious one-day races in men's road cycling.

In a statement for L'Equipe, Pogačar said it was not difficult for him to remain motivated "even more so when you know I have a long contract with my team and many years ahead of me. And when you have good results, motivation comes easily. It's more complicated when you don't win much or at all".

Second place among men went to Swedish pole vaulter Armand Duplantis and third to Spanish tennis player Carlos Alcaraz. In the women's competition, the 19-year-old Canadian swimming sensation McIntosh was followed by US hurdler and sprinter Sydney Mclaughlin-Levrone and US sprinter Melissa Jefferson-Wooden.

In winning the Champion of Champions title, Pogačar and McIntosh find themselves in the company of the likes of Simone Biles, Novak Djoković, Lionel Messi, Serena Williams and Usain Bolt, among a great number of other highly successful athletes.

"Honestly, I wouldn't have put myself on that list. I can't place myself that high," Pogačar told L'Equipe as he accepted the award, adding he was "not a big star".

Looking forward to the upcoming season, Pogi, as he is known to his fans, plans to improve further and focus on claiming the record-equalling fifth Tour de France title and conquering the Monuments he has yet to win, that is Paris-Roubaix and Milano-Sanremo.

Photo: Nebojša Tejić/STA