Tour de France leader Taddei Pogachar has dismissed the idea of being pro cycling's next cannibal, despite his obvious preference for scoring wins whenever possible and leaving few to his rivals.

Pogachar (open in new tab) has racked up eight stage wins in three Tour de France (open in new tab) events and two last week.Pogachar, the leader of UAE Team Emirates (open in new tab), is currently the third Tour de France winner He has been mentioned as a contender, but is dismissive about comparisons to the original "cannibal" Eddy Merckx.

"I mean, who doesn't always want to win? I mean, who doesn't want to win all the time?"

"I think yesterday [Sunday] was about setting the pace that every rider on the team liked. At one point it looked like we were going to take the stage, but the guys in front of us were too strong."

"We looked like we were going to take the stage, but the guys in front of us were too strong.

"We then kept things under control until the finish and sprinted with 350m to go. Jonas Vingegaard was the only one on my wheel and we were three seconds ahead of the rest of the field.

Vingegaard was evenly matched with Pogachar on Chatel and Planche des Belle Filles, but Pogachar was again tight-lipped about how he would handle the Dane, now second overall and 39 seconds behind him, on the long climb in the second week of the Tour.

"We'll have to see this week. There were some climbs, but they weren't crazy hard. Tomorrow will be like a warm-up, but the Col du Granon and the Alpe d'Huez will be the two big stages."

"I don't know what will happen, but I'm confident I'm in good shape and I want to use my good legs this week."

"I'll have to see what happens.

As for the Alpe d'Huez itself, which has never been raced, Pogachar said it is an iconic hard climb.

"It will be a hot and hard stage," he warned.

"It will be one of the legendary stages of the race. It will be fun to watch on TV, but not very runnable for us. I'm looking forward to it."

Pogachar has completed the latest COVID-19 test without any problems, but is aware of the heatwave in central and southern France that he must be aware of.

"It will be the same for everyone, I don't think anyone likes to run for five hours in 40°C and I don't think it's healthy," he suggested.

"It's going to be a tough week with extreme weather. We just have to do everything right and hope it stays cool enough to run a proper race."

He brushed off the idea that he might be stronger in warmer weather, as Vingegaard suggested in a pre-race interview.

"I don't know, we have to wait for this 35 degrees. I'm not that bad in warm weather and I trained in hot weather for many days before the Tour. I don't know when the real test will be."

"The Tour of Slovenia was very hot, and both times I rode Alpe d'Huez in training it was 37 degrees. So I know what will happen next week and I am not scared."

Pogachar could have stayed in yellow all the way to Paris, but he expressed mixed feelings that it would have been wiser to "pass" to another team to relieve the pressure on him for a few days. Pogachal revealed his innate ambition and said that he was aware that it was strategically wise to do so, but that neither he nor his teammates wanted to hand over the jersey.

"As of yesterday, I could have given up the yellow jersey if I wanted to, but my teammates like the yellow jersey as much as I do. But I think my teammates like the yellow jersey as much as I do. We've worked hard all year to get this jersey."

"Also, with something like this COVID-19, you never know when you're going to get it home. 0]

Pogachar recognized that aside from the usual challenges, there was one thing that would put a definite stop to his current challenge for the Tour Yellow. Pogachar believes that whoever has the highest viral dose should go home.

"If you test positive for more than 33 points, that means you are highly contagious and that is not good for your teammates and staff," he insisted.

"The group is always in close contact with each other, so if you test positive it's best to go home. Whether you have the yellow jersey or not, it's not safe for the other athletes. Especially since they race every day in such harsh conditions.

Pogachar concluded the interview by paying tribute to longtime Australian sporting director Alan Piper, who retired last season for personal health reasons. Piper was one of the key members of the UAE Team Emirates management and a key player in the success of the 2020 Tour.

He wrote a letter of thanks to Pogachar before the Slovenian took on the cobblestones of Allenberg, near Piper's home in Belgium.

"I really miss Alain, because I have wonderful memories of him from that day in 2020," Pogachar said.

"Everyone on the team misses him. He was a great guy, a great sport director, and a great mentor to all of us. We were young and sometimes confused about racing. He was someone we looked up to."