Tadej Pogacar’s next contract will not be about money. It will be about the plane that gets him to the races.

His agent Alex Carera meets UAE Team Emirates-XRG’s president Matar Suhail Al Yabhouni Al Dhaheri and manager Mauro Gianetti in Monaco on Friday morning, one day before Pogacar rolls down the ramp of the Vuelta a España’s opening time trial in the Principality. The purpose is an extension of a deal that already runs through the end of 2030, taking Pogacar through 2031.

Pogacar is already earning around €8m a year, and neither side is pretending the negotiation is going to be settled by adding to that.

“It is not about the money, but about a number of special clauses,” Carera told Cycling Up To Date.

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Private jet, race calendar, bonuses

The clauses under discussion read like the operating manual of a rider who wins whenever he starts. According to the reporting, the “special clauses” are understood to cover:

• Use of a private jet to and from certain races

• Schedule control over which events Pogacar rides

• Performance bonuses tied to results

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“We are meeting in Monaco on Friday morning, but we are all taking our time with it,” Carera said.

The agent expects talks to run for around a month, because this is not a standard contract.

The jet clause is the one that will get read out at dinner parties, but it is also the one that says the most about how the top of the sport now works. A Grand Tour rider is expected to arrive rested, hydrated and free of the airport-lounge virus that can wreck a training block. Commercial travel is not built for any of that. For a team whose season is planned around Pogacar staying upright and healthy, a plane on standby is closer to a logistics tool than a perk.

Talks that will outlast the opening week

The timing is the strange part. The Vuelta’s Grand Départ in Monaco runs from Thursday to Sunday, with the team presentation on Thursday, the individual time trial through the Principality on Saturday, and stage two heading into France on Sunday.

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Pogacar will spend the day before it in a room with his agent, his team president and his team manager, discussing airport transfers.

Neither side sounds in a hurry. On Carera’s timeline, the paperwork could still be open in late September, well after Pogacar has stopped racing for lines on a map and started racing for the red jersey.

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