Tadej Pogacar (UAE Team Emirates) refused to throw in the towel on the UAE Tour despite losing to Adam Yates on the climb to Jebel Hafeet on stage 3.The Slovenian rider, who started the seven-day race as the favorite to win, was 6 km from the summit, failed to react to Yates' initial attack and finished 1:03 behind the leader, although he had Yates within 15 seconds of him. Yates now leads the race by 1:07 over Pogacar.

"I might be a little disappointed with my run, but I saw how strong Adam was. In that heat, with the gas pedal at full throttle, it was still really good," said the young Slovenian at the finish.

"Maybe I could have followed him, but he was stronger than me, so there is no doubt he would have won. But he was stronger, so I'm sure he would have won."

The race will return to the same climb on stage 5 and will likely end in a group sprint for the rest of the days. It is hard to imagine Yates winning again two days later after his dominant showing on Tuesday, but Pogacar, who won in Valenciana this year, at least gave the impression that he will fight to the end.

"Of course we'll try, but he's in really good shape. I'm going to do everything I can to attack him, but we'll see what happens."

The UAE Team Emirates team, with Pogacar supported by Davide Formolo and Diego Ulissi, certainly made up the numbers on the final climb today, but when Yates cleared, their numbers hardly counted.

"We didn't expect him to go, but when he did, he went really, really hard," UAE Emirates team director Neal Stephens told Cycling News.

"It wasn't a question of whether he should have gone, he should have gone. But I should have gone. I thought, 'Let's cool down a little bit. Then I tried to pick him up. It didn't happen, so I had to use Tadej."

Pogacar quickly regained his position after Alexey Lutsenko and David Gaudoux briefly joined Yates and then attacked through the gap. However, despite cutting Yates' lead to less than 20 seconds, Pogacar eventually ran out of steam.

"He got to within 15 seconds of Yates, but couldn't get any closer," Stefan said. It wasn't that Taddei had a bad climb, Adam was better. It wasn't that Taddei's climbing was bad, Adam was better, but Adam was better. Taddei did a great climb.

Barring catastrophe or major changes, the GC will probably head to Mitchelton Scott. That leaves Stéphane with the challenge of keeping the team camp highly motivated. Fernando Gaviria will have a second chance to challenge Yates in the sprint, and Pogacar in stage 5.

"We are now readjusting our goals," Stéphane told Cycling News.

"I'm still on the podium and there are still stages left. We have flat stages with sprinters and we will fight every day. The team classification is also a big goal."