Paul Seixas: Tour de France Winner 2031

[Alexandre B.]

3 stage wins at a top-tier WorldTour stage race. At 19 yo.

Tomorrow, I believe they announce rain? It is a known weakness (Junior WC 2024, Tour of the Alps).

 

[Netserk]

Junior WC 2024

i forgot , was he involved in the crash of albert or distanced in the attack before that ?

 

[Berniece]

Doubt he finished top 5 in this years TDF. Too young, not able to perform yet for 3 weeks straight

 

[Alexandre B.]

i forgot , was he involved in the crash of albert or distanced in the attack before that ?

He was distanced before the crash.

 

[YavorD]

Doubt he finished top 5 in this years TDF. Too young, not able to perform yet for 3 weeks straight

With the track record some of his opponents have, he can be top 5 even with a significant drop of performance.

 

[Brullnux]

Doubt he finished top 5 in this years TDF. Too young, not able to perform yet for 3 weeks straight

It is worth remembering though that in the past four editions we have had Gaudu, Onley, CRod, and Vlasov in the top five. You can have off days (even multiple off days) and still finish top five at the Tour, or so recent years have suggested.

 

[Coppi-Bartali]

Doubt he finished top 5 in this years TDF. Too young, not able to perform yet for 3 weeks straight

Seeing how he's constantly improving, I wouldn't say that. Who do you see ahead of him right now? Apart from Pogacar and Vingegaard. Maybe Lipowitz in three weeks. If Seixas continues to improve as he has improved from Avenir to autumn, from autumn to Algarve and from Algarve to Itzulia, his level could be monstrous in July.

Remco is no guarantee in mountain, INEOS riders aren´t guarantee in mountain. Blobloblo will be in the top10, no more.
Almeida won't be at the Tour and this year he seems to be in disastrous form. Del Toro has problems in the high mountains, Ayuso has the same problem.

 

[Red Rick]

Clear favorite for 3rd, but I think today showed he is much closer to getting beaten by the mortals than he is to challenging Vingegaard, nevermind Pogacar.

 

[saunaking]

Doubt he finished top 5 in this years TDF. Too young, not able to perform yet for 3 weeks straight

because he can't recover well (yet?) or because he has no chill?

 

[Coppi-Bartali]

Clear favorite for 3rd, but I think today showed he is much closer to getting beaten by the mortals than he is to challenging Vingegaard, nevermind Pogacar.

He's 19 , had a two-minute lead before the stage started, and he's the one who's been pulling the hardest. Even though he hasn't made a solo today, that's a very easy win because under those circumstances hes led the stage as he pleased. Vingegaard had a similar stage at Paris-Nice with Lenny.

In this Itzulia he has shown himself to be far above the rest of the candidates for the Tour podium. Looking at the second stage, one day he could be closer to second place in the Tour than fourth. I haven't seen Lipowitz or Vauquelin win a stage like that. Only Rogic in the past.

 

[Berniece]

Seeing how he's constantly improving, I wouldn't say that. Who do you see ahead of him right now? Apart from Pogacar and Vingegaard. Maybe Lipowitz in three weeks. If Seixas continues to improve as he has improved from Avenir to autumn, from autumn to Algarve and from Algarve to Itzulia, his level could be monstrous in July.

Remco is no guarantee in mountain, INEOS riders aren´t guarantee in mountain. Blobloblo will be in the top10, no more.
Almeida won't be at the Tour and this year he seems to be in disastrous form. Del Toro has problems in the high mountains, Ayuso has the same problem.

Lipowitz and Evenepoel easily if they reach their 2025 and 2024 level respectively. After seeing todays stage I just wonder how Seixas will perform during stage 19 or 20. I can see a total collapse and losing 20min. He went from dropping everyone and taking 1-2min to not looking much stronger than Lipowitz in 2-3 days. If you accumulate the energy drain, it might get really hard, really fast. Which is fine btw, he's 19.

because he can't recover well (yet?) or because he has no chill?

Recovery. Which comes with time anyway.

 

[Coppi-Bartali]

Lipowitz and Evenepoel easily if they reach their 2025 and 2024 level respectively. After seeing todays stage I just wonder how Seixas will perform during stage 19 or 20. I can see a total collapse and losing 20min. He went from dropping everyone and taking 1-2min to not looking much stronger than Lipowitz in 2-3 days. If you accumulate the energy drain, it might get really hard, really fast. Which is fine btw, he's 19.


Recovery. Which comes with time anyway.

I don't think Lipowitz is far from his level as last year. I'd say that at this point he's stronger than he was in April last year. In general, BORA ridersare stronger this year.
Remco's problem is that his exceptional performance in high mountains is a one-year exception.

 

[AlfaLum]

Lipowitz and Evenepoel easily if they reach their 2025 and 2024 level respectively. After seeing todays stage I just wonder how Seixas will perform during stage 19 or 20. I can see a total collapse and losing 20min. He went from dropping everyone and taking 1-2min to not looking much stronger than Lipowitz in 2-3 days. If you accumulate the energy drain, it might get really hard, really fast. Which is fine btw, he's 19.


Recovery. Which comes with time anyway.

I agree with you, allthough this is also a race where every stage is hard and has been racer to the fullest by him. While in the Tour there are days that have no GC action or situation where he will not be the one having to carry almost all of the responsibility in his group.

But the 3 weeks definitely is not in his advantage measured against some of the older competitors.

 

[Rou]

I wouldn't send him to the Tour just for the media attention and profits. This Itzulia has been raced hard and we clearly see how it is tiring him. Yesterday a pensioner Izagirre dropped him and today a triathlete Romo caught him.
The Tour raced super hard between Tadej and Jonas might completely crack him and hurt his morale.
I would send him to the Vuelta where he might even win and go to the Tour in 2027 with experience of a 3 week race.

 

[TrekCyclist]

He is great, but maybe we should expext him be on TdF Podium this year automatically.
Most good GC riders were more in their mid 20s, when they got their first top results, Seems to take some years to develop full recovery abilities.
There are exceptions, of course, but they are rather few.

 

[yaf2]

Lipowitz and Evenepoel easily if they reach their 2025 and 2024 level respectively. After seeing todays stage I just wonder how Seixas will perform during stage 19 or 20. I can see a total collapse and losing 20min. He went from dropping everyone and taking 1-2min to not looking much stronger than Lipowitz in 2-3 days. If you accumulate the energy drain, it might get really hard, really fast. Which is fine btw, he's 19.


Recovery. Which comes with time anyway.

I don’t think we should panic yet about his chances in grand tours(recovery) in the next years since he is only a teenager. He has already showed a clear sign that he has the power to win the big races but the recovery was my big question as I’ve seen him already in algarve that he has top condition for the first couple of days & a little less as the week goes by. This reminds me of Mvdp where he is an excellent racer for 1 or 2 days but his lactate clearance capacity is not as good as the others like wva where the later always exceeds in grand tours. It’s a natural thing I guess, certainly for vdp. And for Seixas I just hope this is the age & experience issue rather than the recovery issue of mvdp otherwise the french hope of tour winner could soon turn into Alaphilippe type top one day racer. Btw pog in his first year pro in vuelta he was consistent(apart from heat) & has won the 20th stage + 2 stage wins along the race

 

[Coppi-Bartali]

He leads the race by the largest margin in years. He won the third stage despite being 19 and done the most work all days.

Not winning by another minute today doesn't change the fact that he's still dominant. He's controlling the race at will at just 19. I don't know what more you want, he have to win by 5 minutes so he we say he was better than the third-place in last year's Tour?

More than two minutes isn't enough? Vingegaard beat Lipowitz by 1:30 in Catalonia.

 

[canina82]

The guy was humiliating Lipo in the beginning of this race. There is no chance Seixas doesn't improve until the Tour and he will probably be 2nd or 3rd there (I'm concerned about Jonas doing the Giro).

 

[AlfaLum]

If he wasnt French I would definitely sent him to the Tour. But with the French being French I would still go to the Vuelta with him this year.

With both Pogacar and Vingegaard skipping the Vuelta he actually has a chance to win it I think. It is the GT that is raced the least hard, it allows for 1-2 raids and consolidating from there.

But he will probably really want to go for the WC where Pogacar will likely burn him anyhow. The sensible thing to do is to refrain from thinking he can challenge Pogacar and Vingegaard this season and try that next year.

 

[yaf2]

He leads the race by the largest margin in years. He won the third stage despite being 19 and done the most work all days.

Not winning by another minute today doesn't change the fact that he's still dominant. He's controlling the race at will at just 19. I don't know what more you want, he have to win by 5 minutes so he we say he was better than the third-place in last year's Tour?

More than two minutes isn't enough? Vingegaard beat Lipowitz by 1:30 in Catalonia.

Nobody talked about if he is not the strongest in the race or … we were talking about his level getting a drop from the first couple of days which is clear to see but it doesn’t mean he is still not the strongest. We’re trying to analyze his level & ability to beat the two best gc riders atm in pog & ving. For example if both were here they would back up their first 2 days performances at any stage they want whether its the 5th or 15th day.

 

[Coppi-Bartali]

Nobody talked about if he is not the strongest in the race or … we were talking about his level getting a drop from the first couple of days which is clear to see but it doesn’t mean he is still not the strongest. We’re trying to analyze his level & ability to beat the two best gc riders atm in pog & ving. For example if both were here they would back up their first 2 days performances at any stage they want whether its the 5th or 15th day.

We're talking about his chances of finishing third in the Tour, and we have the third in this race whom he's easily beating.

 

[jotafap]

We're talking about his chances of finishing third in the Tour, and we have the third in this race whom he's easily beating.

Agreed. Obviously a 3 week race can be too much, but until we know that for sure, he looks more than capable to fight with everyone who is not Pogacar, and possibly Ving (only saying possibly because he will do the Giro, otherwise not even close yet).

 

[Coppi-Bartali]

I think you're in a phase of denial because it's hard to accept that a 19-year rider who won the Avenir while by 30 seconds to Widar is now holding this advantage months later.

Look at these differences and then say what you said before. He's ahead of Lipowitz more than Pogacar was at the Dauphiné. Should he have gained time on him again today and finished the general classification with a 5-minute lead?

These differences are absurd at 19. And we're discussing that he hasn't been strong enough today to gain more time, despite having won after the efforts of previous days to get to 2:30.

1	1	-	Pogačar Tadej	UAE Team Emirates - XRG	500	250	36″	29:19:46
2	2	-	Vingegaard Jonas	Team Visma | Lease a Bike	400	190	24″	0:59
3	3	-	Lipowitz Florian	Red Bull - BORA - hansgrohe	325	160	8″	2:38

1	1	-	Seixas Paul	Decathlon CMA CGM Team	8	20″	16:33:45
2	3	▲1	Florian Lipowitz	Red Bull - BORA - hansgrohe		8″	2:30
3	2	▼1	Roglič Primož	Red Bull - BORA - hansgrohe		4″	3:40

1	1	-	Vingegaard Jonas	Team Visma | Lease a Bike	400	250	24″	25:56:36
2	2	-	Martinez Lenny	Bahrain - Victorious	320	190	13″	1:22
3	3	-	Lipowitz Florian	Red Bull - BORA - hansgrohe	260	160	5″	1:30