With 49.8 kilometers to go, Tadej Pogacar crashed. For a moment, everyone in front of their television held their breath, because the Slovenian went off the road after sliding on the asphalt and his fall ended in a bramble bush. Despite the injuries to his shoulder and leg, Pogacar returned to the race and not only caught up with Pidcock, but managed to overtake him and arrive alone at the finish line in Siena. "When I started, I probably wanted to win in a different way. Certainly not like this... Maybe later I'll feel the pain of the crash, but I can say I enjoyed myself until I crossed the finish line. Now I'm in the adrenaline depletion phase and I'm starting to feel a lot of pain".

Pogacar had a leg and arm full of abrasions and a torn outfit. There should be no hidden damage, so he will be able to continue with his schedule.

"It's not the best way to win a race, but a win is a win. Let's hope it's nothing worse than what can be seen and I hope everything will be fine". The images showed how the rear wheel lost grip in the curve and that's why the world champion ended up on the ground at high speed. "I think I was going too fast. I know this road very well. I've certainly driven it at least 20 times in my life. But sometimes calculations are wrong and clearly I made a mistake. I simply slipped and sometimes that can happen".

Tadej Pogacar kept his cool and immediately got back on the bike after the fall, although he was then forced to change it. "For a moment I thought I wouldn't make it, I didn't know if I was okay and my bike wasn't working, so I had to change it. I was a bit worried because when you fall, you never know how your body will react. But I still had enough energy to reach the finish line".

The Slovenian set a new race record, as he is the first reigning world champion to have won Strade Bianche and now has reached Fabian Cancellara, who held the record of three victories in this race.

"Today was a beautiful race, it was super fast, there was a really strong breakaway and our guys did an incredible job at the front and we were always going fast. It was a really tough race and now that I've won this race three times, I can also have a gravel section named after me".