{"id":835609,"date":"2026-07-30T09:41:10","date_gmt":"2026-07-30T09:41:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/835609\/"},"modified":"2026-07-30T09:41:10","modified_gmt":"2026-07-30T09:41:10","slug":"lefeveres-doubts-about-paul-seixas-are-confirmed-at-the-tour","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/835609\/","title":{"rendered":"Lefevere’s doubts about Paul Seixas are confirmed at the Tour"},"content":{"rendered":"

We almost forgot about it amid Tadej Pogacar\u2019s fifth overall victory<\/a> and Mathieu van der Poel\u2019s<\/a> remarkable stage win, but a 19-year-old French kid also did quite well in Paris on Sunday. Many believed Paul Seixas<\/a> should never have ridden the Tour de France at such a young age, but with a fourth-place finish in the overall standings<\/a>, he confirmed his status as a rising star.Seixas burst onto the scene in 2025, when he was promoted from the development team to the WorldTour at Decathlon CMA CGM<\/a> as an 18-year-old top prospect. He won the Tour de l’Avenir, finished third at the European Championships, and was already proving himself as a stage racer. In 2026, he took a major step forward, winning the Tour of the Basque Country and the Fl\u00e8che Wallonne<\/a>.<\/p>\n

He also finished second in the Algarve (with a stage win), came in second behind Pogacar in Li\u00e8ge\u2013Bastogne\u2013Li\u00e8ge and Strade Bianche, and let\u2019s not forget his victory in the Faun-Ard\u00e8che Classic. Still, a Tour de France debut seemed a step too far, as Seixas had never ridden a Grand Tour before. Decathlon CMA CGM took a chance, however, and it paid off.<\/p>\n

Continue reading below the photo<\/p>\n

\"seixas-tulett\"\/<\/p>\n

Seixas won the Fl\u00e8che Wallonne in April, which marked the start of his Tour de France selection.<\/p>\n

Benoot thinks Seixas can win the Tour de FranceTiesj Benoot was the veteran who had Seixas under his wing for three weeks during the Tour de France. The Belgian saw an impressive team leader at work. \u201cHe\u2019s only 19, you know. Paul still watches South Park every day. He\u2019s still in a different phase of his life,\u201d he said Sunday on Sporza<\/a>. \u201cI do think he can hold onto the hope of winning the Tour.\u201d<\/p>\n

Benoot doubts whether that will be during the Tadej Pogacar era. \u201cBut I also don\u2019t think Pogacar will be racing at this level for another ten years. The atmosphere in the team was really good. We were able to contend for a result every day. In the sprints, Olav (Kooij, ed.) finished in the top 3 very often, and in the other stages we had Paul.\u201d<\/p>\n

Continue reading below the photo<\/p>\n

\"paul-seixas\"\/Lefevere raises questions about SeixasPatrick Lefevere<\/a> also enjoyed the Tour de France, particularly the performance of his former prot\u00e9g\u00e9 Remco Evenepoel, who finished second<\/a> riding for Red Bull-BORA-hansgrohe. \u201cDespite everything, Tadej is only human. Remco is two years younger; he needs to keep moving forward and persevere,\u201d Lefevere told Cyclism\u2019Actu<\/a> regarding Evenepoel\u2019s chances in the Tour.<\/p>\n

Seixas will need to have the same mindset, although Lefevere thinks the Frenchman needs more time. \u201cI\u2019m impressed, though I wouldn\u2019t have let him ride the Tour just yet. He started to falter a bit in the third week, which is completely normal. He\u2019ll become a great rider, but we mustn\u2019t rush things. We can\u2019t skip any steps.\u201d<\/p>\n

“Finishing fourth in the Tour de France at age 19 is exceptional,” said PatLef. “Isaac del Toro is probably a bit stronger, but Pogacar also helped him a lot as a teammate. Without him, Del Toro probably would never have made it onto the podium and likely wouldn\u2019t have won the second stage in Barcelona.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"We almost forgot about it amid Tadej Pogacar\u2019s fifth overall victory and Mathieu van der Poel\u2019s remarkable stage…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":835610,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[445],"tags":[49,48,635,175351,291537,141519,82,262636],"class_list":["post-835609","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-cycling","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-cycling","tag-decathlon-cma-cgm","tag-patrick-lefevere","tag-paul-seixas","tag-sports","tag-tour-de-france-2026"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/835609","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=835609"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/835609\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/835610"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=835609"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=835609"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=835609"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}