State of the Peloton 2026

[Rackham]

44.426 km/h average speed today in Liege. More than 2km/h faster than the previous record.
Seems like the Peloton is doing well...

Trickle down dope-economics has made the peloton faster than ever. But Pogi is also going faster. It's relentless.

 

[YellowSocks]

New Word record in the marathon this morning. Everything is fine.

 

[Ilmaestro99]

I honestly think the financial inequality in the peleton plays a much greater role in this than a lot of people realise. UAE has been himiliating the sport with pocagar since 2019. Suddenly decathlon is going the same with muaddhib. Nothing is going to happen to these guys because of the money behind their teams

 

[Krzysztof_O]

Trickle down dope-economics has made the peloton faster than ever. But Pogi is also going faster. It's relentless.

How do you feel about your compatriot, the French Messiah? His improvement in the last 12 months is faster than light!

 

[Rackham]

How do you feel about your compatriot, the French Messiah? His improvement in the last 12 months is faster than light!

Amazing. Incredible. But with a giant caveat: is there room for improvement? It's the big question because yes of course taken at face value he's insane this year but just how good will he be?

I feel like we're going to spend all year raving about him and he'll IMO be on the Tour podium (fairly easily as well with a shot at second) but then there's that moment where he needs to actually take the fight to Pog and beat him. And based on what we saw today he's still quite a long way off that.

Usually GT riders also make a jump in level between now and July. I'm super curious to see whether he can do the same.

 

[Netserk]

i think the peloton wide increase in strength year after year is a good indicator that motordoping is an insufficient explanation for the change in cycling , and that it may also be entirely unnecessary for the very fastest riders

 

[Krzysztof_O]

Amazing. Incredible. But with a giant caveat: is there room for improvement? It's the big question because yes of course taken at face value he's insane this year but just how good will he be?

I feel like we're going to spend all year raving about him and he'll IMO be on the Tour podium (fairly easily as well with a shot at second) but then there's that moment where he needs to actually take the fight to Pog and beat him. And based on what we saw today he's still quite a long way off that.

Usually GT riders also make a jump in level between now and July. I'm super curious to see whether he can do the same.

So do you think that his faster than light progression will completely halt soon? Even at his current level he's a future multiple Tour and monument winner. I mean, the guy withstood yolo Pogacar's attack on Redoute: didn't you see how the rest teleported backwards on Redoute? Pogi went deeper than in previous years but it wasn't enough to go solo there.

 

[Rackham]

So do you think that his faster than light progression will completely halt soon?

Yep! That's my controversial bet. We'll see how it plays out and I won't make many friends in France (lol) because the hype is off the charts but I'm seeing pros jump onto the scene at a really young age, hit a massive level and them kaboom, they hit a plateau and stay there. Evenepoel? Check. Ayuso? Check. The list goes on and on. The almighty 'marge de progression énorme!' you'll hear commentators here raving about is just a fanciful inherited memory from a bygone era when riders peaked in their mid to late 20's.

Nowadays these pro outfits give these young riders whatever prep can make them hit their peak as early as possible and then the 'polish' phase which adds a few % is a much softer tangent.

 

[Krzysztof_O]

Yep! That's my controversial bet. We'll see how it plays out and I won't make many friends in France (lol) because the hype is off the charts but I'm seeing pros jump onto the scene at a really young age, hit a massive level and them kaboom, they hit a plateau and stay there. Evenepoel? Check. Ayuso? Check. The list goes on and on. The almighty 'marge de progression énorme!' you'll hear commentators here raving about is just a fanciful inherited memory from a bygone era when riders peaked in their mid to late 20's.

Nowadays these pro outfits give these young riders whatever prep can make them hit their peak as early as possible and then the 'polish' phase which adds a few % is a much softer tangent.

Even if his progression stagnates soon (you could be right) he's already at the level enough to win multiple Tours and monuments (once Pogacar declines a bit). And the polishing you mention should still up his level a bit. There's 8 years gap, remember.

 

[Rackham]

Even if his progression stagnates soon (you could be right) he's already at the level enough to win multiple Tours and monuments (once Pogacar declines a bit). And the polishing you mention should still up his level a bit. There's 8 years gap, remember.

I know I know. But then I think maybe (& this is just a guestimate) the rise of Seixas will have another effect and that's giving Pog motivation. The Pog we saw today was absolutely brutal. Maybe the pre-race hype of Seixas has driven him to be more of a killer out there.

I'm just pushing back slightly against the absolute certainty so many have right now that Seixas is going to win the Tour de France. Cycling has a way of screwing with dreams (just look at Evenepoel fans, i.e. when he was 19 they did not foresee he'd be where he currently is in the pecking order).

 

[ppanther92]

Amazing. Incredible. But with a giant caveat: is there room for improvement?

Leaving aside the age totally (which also would be unprecedented that a 19Y old guy doesn’t improve - but for the sake of argument): he right now is improving rapidly. From 2025 to 2026. From Algarve to Itzulia. From Strade to today. Why would that abruptly stop? There is not any good reason for that.

 

[Rackham]

Leaving aside the age totally (which also would be unprecedented that a 19Y old guy doesn’t improve - but for the sake of argument): he right now is improving rapidly. From 2025 to 2026. From Algarve to Itzulia. From Strade to today. Why would that abruptly stop? There is not any good reason for that.

Yeah there is. Because the riders he's up against have a jump in level between Liège and the Tour and there's no certainty he does the same leap. I also don't see today's Seixas as inherently superior to Itzulia Seixas FYI considering the different type of race. What is noticeable is just like Pog he can ride monuments as well as stage races (something a rider like Vingegaard cannot do).

 

[ppanther92]

Yeah there is. Because the riders he's up against have a jump in level between Liège and the Tour and there's no certainty he does the same leap. I also don't see today's Seixas as inherently superior to Itzulia Seixas FYI considering the different type of race. What is noticeable is just like Pog he can ride monuments as well as stage races (something a rider like Vingegaard cannot do).

Ok but thats more an argument on how well he will do in the Tour and peaking in the season vs. development in general. Since he very apparently developed quite recently and significantly, I just can’t see how he would not become better still.

 

[Rackham]

Ok but thats more an argument on how well he will do in the Tour and peaking in the season vs. development in general. Since he very apparently developed quite recently and significantly, I just can’t see how he would not become better still.

*checks thread* Okay, since we're in the clinic, gloves off: because Seixas, his trainer and medical staff hit the sweet spot and jumped to the max level really early.

If he continues to grow from here, I'll be very, very surprised (just imagine the level? He'd become better than Pog... which is unthinkable).

 

[ppanther92]

Like just going to the Seixas thread (where that discussion would probably anyway belong) - people are debating on how he is developing so rapidly. I just cannot see why all of a sudden April 2026 would have been his peak when its right in a phase where he showed massive improvement still.

 

[ppanther92]

*checks thread* Okay, since we're in the clinic, gloves off: because Seixas, his trainer and medical staff hit the sweet spot and jumped to the max level really early.

If he continues to grow from here, I'll be very, very surprised (just imagine the level? He'd become better than Pog... which is unthinkable).

I think the marginal improvement will decline obviously but even if the program is now maxed out - simply by his physical condition he will improve still. He will become better than he is now.
But in general - we shall see and time will anyway tell

 

[Netserk]

Leaving aside the age totally (which also would be unprecedented that a 19Y old guy doesn’t improve - but for the sake of argument): he right now is improving rapidly. From 2025 to 2026. From Algarve to Itzulia. From Strade to today. Why would that abruptly stop? There is not any good reason for that.

yep that is exactly my line of thinking too

he could be 22 or 25 and there would still be no good reason to expect his trajectory to suddenly come to a halt other than already concluding that he can only reach a given lvl and then reason from that that he must stop improving when he gets there

 

[Ilmaestro99]

Does anyone have a breakdown of la redoute climbing times year by year?

 

[meat puppet]

With or without doping and contemporary training practices, I think it is highly unlikely that a 19yo has already maxed out on muscle respiratory capacity.

Vo2max *maybe*, but not capillaries and mitochondria in the muscles, probably not efficiency either. Miles upon miles are still required, everything else notwithstanding.

Unless of course some next level voodoo is going on, stacking up these gains is the name of the game. Doping raises the ceiling and makes riding the knife edge more sustainable.

 

[Samu Cuenca]

Does anyone have a breakdown of la redoute climbing times year by year?

Yes, I had a mental breakdown when I saw the times from today.

 

[Rackham]

I think the marginal improvement will decline obviously but even if the program is now maxed out - simply by his physical condition he will improve still. He will become better than he is now.
But in general - we shall see and time will anyway tell

I think what we've been subjected to since 2020 in this sport has been such B.S. of massive proportions (& this is across the entire peloton) that I pretty much have a pathologically engrained 'mental block' to appraise the performances we're witnessing with anything other than the utmost cynicism, suspicion and a refusal to be dragged into debates regarding the logic in what we're seeing (& that applies to talk of rider progression as well, like we could even possibly start to imagine there's some 'normal' progression to be had here).

It means if someone wants to analyse Seixas' rise from a standpoint of normalcy then that's on them. But I can't. I'd feel like an absolute cretin because it's literal "I believe in Santa Claus" level delusion. I mean hooray for the TdF right? (because a Frenchman is going to be huge this summer) but come on now, the stratospheric level is just ridiculous.

And no, I have no idea if he can improve on this because I don't know what he did to become so strong so suddenly. And that means I can't even begin to assume linear progression is possible because maybe it absolutely is not. It's certainly debatable whether a rider like Evenepoel (for example) has progressed, i.e. with fans left imagining crashes and weight fluctuations over the years are to be blamed for the relative stagnation.