conditions." After the Tour de France, Pogačar won the bronze medal in the men's road race at the Olympic Games after finishing behind Wout van Aert in the sprint for the silver medal. At the end of July, UAE Team Emirates announced that they had agreed a one-year extension to his contract, committing him to the team up to the end of 2027. Pogačar took a break from racing following the Olympics, returning to competition at the Bretagne Classic Ouest–France at the end of August, where he initially managed to follow an attack by Alaphilippe on a gravelled climb 60 km from the finish along with Mikkel Frølich Honoré and Benoît Cosnefroy, but was dropped by the other escapees who went on to take the podium places. In September he competed at the European Road Championships in Trentino: in the road race, after a number of breakaways had emerged and been caught by the peloton, he was able to follow an attack by Matteo Trentin to form part of a lead group which expanded to include ten riders, however he was unable to keep pace with a further attack from this group 23 km from the end of the race, with a three-man selection of Remco Evenepoel, Sonny Colbrelli and Cosnefroy dropping their rivals and securing themselves the medals. At the Road World Championships in Flanders later that month, Pogačar finished 37th in the road race. He then moved on to Italy in October to compete in the autumn classics held there: although he failed to finish the Giro dell'Emilia, he made an impression at Tre Valli Varesine, animating the race with a long-race attack from 120 km: although he lost contact with the head of the race due to a puncture he won the sprint in the chase group to finish third. At Milano–Torino, Pogačar managed to keep pace with the other favourites for most of the day, emerging from the peloton's fragmentation in crosswinds 65 km from the end as part of a front group which absorbed the day's early breakaway, and remaining in contention for the win until losing contact with Adam Yates and Roglič in the closing kilometres of the final climb up Superga: he subsequently lost the two-up sprint for third place to João Almeida. A few days later, Pogačar won his second monument at Il Lombardia, responding to an attack by Vincenzo Nibali by