PARIS: Tadej Pogacar became the first Slovenian to win the Tour de France after he retained the overall leader’s yellow jersey in the 21st stage won by Sam Bennett on Sunday.
The Team UAE Emirates rider, who will celebrate his 22nd birthday on Monday, is the youngest man to win the race since Henri Cornet in 1904.

Factbox on Slovenian Tadej Pogacar, who won his maiden Tour de France title on Sunday:
Born: Sept. 21, 1998
Grand Tour titles (1): Tour de France 2020
EARLY CAREER
* Coached by former world road race bronze medallist and fellow Slovenian Andrej Hauptman
* In 2016, he takes third place in the European championships’ road race
* 2018 is Pogacar’s breakthrough year. He wins the Tour de l’Avenir, a stage race for young riders often seen as a springboard for the Tour de France. He also won the mountains classification in that race.
GRAND TOUR DEBUT
* In 2019, Pogacar becomes the youngest winner of the Tour of California
* He also wins the Tour of Algarve
* On his grand tour debut, Pogacar wins three stages at the Vuelta a Espana to finish third overall behind Primoz Roglic and Alejandro Valverde
* In 2020, he gears up for the Tour de France by finishing fourth in the Criterium du Dauphine
* On the Tour de France, the Slovenian champion claims the overall lead on the penultimate day, overturning a 57-second deficit to leapfrog Roglic.
STATISTICS
* Pogacar is the youngest rider to win the Tour de France since Henri Cornet in 1904, the second youngest ever
* He is the first rider to win on his Tour debut since France’s Laurent Fignon in 1983
* He is the first rider since Eddy Merckx in 1969 to hold three distinctive jerseys (yellow, white for the best Under-25, polka dot for the mountains classification). Merckx had won the mountains classification, yellow jersey and green jersey for the points classification
* He is the first rider to snatch the yellow jersey on the penultimate day since Cadel Evans in 2011