Rafal Majka will retire from professional cycling after this season. With the departure of the 35-year-old Pole, Tadej Pogacar will lose an important helper.
“It will be a special Tour of Poland for me, with a lot of emotions,” Majka said on Saturday in a video on Instagram.
With that, Majka announced his last participation in the Tour of Poland and his retirement from professional cycling. It is not yet known when he will ride his last race.
Majka won three stages and twice the mountains classification (2014 and 2016) in the Tour de France. He also achieved two stage victories in the Vuelta a España. The climber finished on the podium once in a major cycling tour: in 2015 he finished third in the Vuelta. In 2016 he won bronze in the Olympic road race.
In addition to his own success, Majka also played an important role in multiple overall victories of Alberto Contador and Pogacar in major cycling tours. The Pole belonged to the UAE Team Emirates team that helped Pogacar to the overall victory in the 2021 Tour de France and the 2024 Giro d’Italia.
The Tour of Poland starts on Monday and ends next Sunday. Majka won the WorldTour race in his own country in 2014.