{"id":722243,"date":"2026-06-08T03:18:22","date_gmt":"2026-06-08T03:18:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/722243\/"},"modified":"2026-06-08T03:18:22","modified_gmt":"2026-06-08T03:18:22","slug":"blow-for-paul-seixas-key-teammate-matthew-riccitello-abandons-tour-auvergne-rhone-alpes-with-sickness-on-stage-1","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/722243\/","title":{"rendered":"Blow for Paul Seixas – Key teammate Matthew Riccitello abandons Tour Auvergne-Rh\u00f4ne-Alpes with sickness on stage 1"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Tour Auvergne-Rh\u00f4ne-Alpes<\/a> may only be underway just a few hours, but Paul Seixas<\/a> has been dealt a blow for his general classification hopes after a key teammate was forced to abandon the race.Arriving with lofty ambitions<\/a> of a GC charge in the WorldTour race, the 19-year-old is hoping to underline his position as a credible challenger to Tadej Pogacar and Jonas Vingegaard’s vice-like grip on the Tour de France. His task to do so has taken a major hit on Saturday after Matthew Riccitello<\/a> left the race.<\/p>\n

The American climber, who singed with the team after an impressive Vuelta a Espana in 2025, was penned to be a key helper for the teenager in the high mountains at the Tour Auvergne-Rh\u00f4ne-Alpes, but has come down with sickness on the eve of the race – with Riccitello stepping off the bike after just over 60 kilometers of racing.<\/p>\n


\nDecathlon CMA CGM confirm the newsConfirming the news, Decathlon CMA CGM said<\/a>: “Feeling sick last night, Matthew Riccitello had to leave the race early. Get well soon Matthew.”<\/p>\n

Speaking before the stage, Seixas confirmed that Riccitello was ill with a suspected case of food poisoning. While harbouring no threat to teammates coming down with illness, the team hoped he could recover as the race went on.<\/p>\n

Seixas said: “Only Matthew [Riccitello] is a bit sick this morning. I think it\u2019s food poisoning, we don\u2019t know for sure yet.<\/p>\n

Seixas still enjoys strong support<\/p>\n

“In any case, it\u2019s not contagious, so we hope he can get through the stage without issues.”<\/p>\n

Although a blow for Seixas, he can still rely on L\u00e9o Bisiaux, Nicolas Prodhomme and Aur\u00e9lien Paret-Peintre for mountain support while Daan Hoole and Stefan Bissegger offer solid protection in flat or hilly parcours.<\/p>\n

Before the stage, Seixas also spoke about the race’s prestige and attraction: \u201cYes, of course. I already did this race last year. It was extremely hard. This year I\u2019m happy to line up again. It\u2019s a beautiful race in my region and I\u2019m glad to take part.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Tour Auvergne-Rh\u00f4ne-Alpes may only be underway just a few hours, but Paul Seixas has been dealt a…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":722244,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[569],"tags":[64,63,784,176987,96148,176605,85,349056],"class_list":["post-722243","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-cycling","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-cycling","tag-decathlon-cma-cgm-team","tag-matthew-riccitello","tag-paul-seixas","tag-sports","tag-tour-auvergne-rhone-alpes"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/722243","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=722243"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/722243\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/722244"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=722243"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=722243"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=722243"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}