The Tour de France is a funny old thing. You spend three weeks inside a bubble, and when it bursts on a Parisian Monday morning, you find yourself not so much reflecting as looking ahead to what’s next. That’s even more true for a 19-year-old, who has their whole career ahead of them, and an immensely promising one at that.
Paul Seixas just finished fourth in his debut Tour de France, and after the big question marks over the wisdom of lining up in the first place, thoughts now turn to the stead in which this experience stands him for the coming years.
But first, the immediate future, and in that respect the relentless Paul Seixas schedule marches on.
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The Frenchman will be afforded precisely two weeks of rest, before embarking on yet another training camp that will see him build up towards an autumn block of one-day racing. Seixas is set to target the World Championships road race in Canada on September 27, and like many, he’ll be out in force at the GP Quebec and GP Montreal beforehand.
After Worlds, he will ride the second Monument of his season in the form of Il Lombardia in October.
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That will amount to a big and busy season for Seixas, who has already spoken about the demands of spending so much time away from home on training camps. It will be interesting to see how he bounces back from a Tour de France that will have been draining in more ways than one, and whether all this is manageable or a tad too much for someone who is, let’s not forget, a teenager.
Seixas finished his first Grand Tour at just 19 (Image credit: Getty Images)The long-term plan
Looking longer term, the Tour de France has seen another brick laid in this potentially monumental career that is being constructed before our eyes.
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The big question ahead of the race was whether the Tour de France was a wise building block, and that’s still up for debate – in fact, we might not know the answer until next year’s Tour de France.
On the one hand, Seixas made it to Paris, and did so in fourth place overall, which is an incredible achievement. On the other hand, there was a sense that this wasn’t quite as exciting as we were led to believe. Seixas lit up the first part of the season with a series of electric performances, with his director Luke Rowe noting that he has “so much panache, charisma, passion, flamboyancy”. However, these qualities were largely absent from Seixas’ Tour, relegated to the more conservative daily grind of the general classification.
“We know his way of racing, the panache – he likes to have fun on the bike and attack,” team manager Mathieu Charpentier said atop A;pe d’Huez after the final mountain stage. “If he didn’t do that I think it’s because he was at his maximum on this Tour de France.”
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All fair enough, but Seixas himself made some interesting comments in an interview in Monday’s L’Équipe, in which it was put to him that he was wrapped in a bubble and didn’t perhaps build much of a rapport with the French public. Seixas had the biggest cheers on the pre-stage podium ceremony each day, but it’s true that between the team bus and the start and finish lines, he didn’t hang around, and his face was always covered by a FFP2 mask.
“Sometimes, I would have liked to have interacted with people more. It’s difficult to see them all waiting and just pass by them,” Seixas said. “But you can quickly get distracted. These are little gains, to the detriment of moments to enjoy with the public. I’d have liked to have shared more, but there were performance priorities for me in this first Tour.”
Seixas fans were out in full force (Image credit: Getty Images)
And so Seixas mania didn’t really take off in the way we thought it might. Of course, asking for all these things – GC solidity, panache, and fan engagement – all at once is asking far too much of a 19-year-old. But some in France have suggested a stage-wins target and a less pressurised GC focus might have been a more fulfilling approach for Seixas’ debut Tour.
The argument coming out of Decathlon is that it’s better that Seixas learns how to be a true GC rider sooner rather than later, even if that means sacrificing a dash of drama in the short-term.
I have a concrete vision of what I have to do to get better, to go further towards my dream of winning a Grand Tour, of winning the Tour de France.
Paul Seixas
“We have a long term project geared around the general classification,” team boss Dominique Serieys told reporters atop Alpe d’Huez. “The priority here was to reach Paris and he has done that. Mission accomplished. At 19 he’s going to have accumulated an experience that few others have at his age.”
That message was echoed by Seixas in his L’Équipe interview, in which he appeared to have a clear idea of his career progression in mind.
“I have a concrete vision of what I have to do to get better, to go further towards my dream of winning a Grand Tour, of winning the Tour de France,” he said.
“This three-week experience was hyper-enriching. I was able to see how you have to be focused each day, know how to position yourself, know how to be there are the right moments, and to go beyond yourself day after day in the mountains.
“It’s the biggest learning curve. It’s a fight with yourself. The Tour allowed me to see how deep I could go. Now, I know what I can do. It has given me a lot for what’s to come.”
Quite how much of a platform this Grand Tour has given Paul Seixas will only become clear in the next Grand Tours he does. That will be next season, which will also highlight the other question mark surrounding his future.
Ever since his stunning performances this Spring, Seixas has been the subject of extensive transfer speculation. Rival teams have formed a queue, reportedly throwing big-money offers into the ring as they try and hook in the sport’s most exciting prospect and perhaps the next realistic rival to the dominance of Tadej Pogačar.
Seixas is a current rival to Pogačar – could he be a future teammate? (Image credit: Getty Images)
Seixas has a contract with Decathlon CMA CGM, whose development system he came through, until the end of 2027. There had been speculation surrounding an early exit for next season, but Seixas is set to see his contract through to the end of next year, though isn’t committing beyond that as things stand.
“I don’t have to act quickly,” Seixas said about this when asked by L’Équipe. “If I stay, I stay, if I leave, I leave. I don’t know how far it’s going to go but I have faith in the team and the team has faith in me.”
The matter could come down to financials, with contracts worth several millions of euros set to be waved in front of Seixas’ face. There has already been talk of Decathlon changing from French to Swiss registration to pave the way to match some of the offers being lined up externally.
But it’s also about the sporting considerations, and in that respect Decathlon are already doing all they can to keep hold of him. As we reported earlier in this Tour de France, the team have just signed the respected domestique Laurens De Plus from Netcompany Ineos, who will join Pavel Sivakov and Ben O’Connor on the incomings list for 2027.
The message is clear, that Decathlon are looking to show their commitment early and show they are building a project around Seixas. The appointment of Romain Bardet as the sporting manager is also a strong statement in this regard.
The transfer talk will rumble on, especially as we head into next season and towards the Tour de France, where we will get the next true measure of Seixas’ progression.
But first, a much-needed two weeks of rest.