French teenage prodigy Paul Seixas to make Tour de France debut this year
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Decathlon CMA-CGM Team's French rider Paul Seixas (left) and UAE Team Emirates-XRG's Slovenian rider Tadej Pogacar in the men's elite race of the Liege-Bastogne-Liege UCI World Tour one-day cycling race on April 26, 2026.
PHOTO: AFP
PARIS – Cycling prodigy Paul Seixas will make his Tour de France debut in 2026, bringing France’s biggest home-grown hope in a generation to the start line of the sport's biggest race.
The 19-year-old Decathlon-CMA CGM rider has prompted intense debate in France after a dazzling start to 2026, with his team weighing the benefits of early exposure to the Tour against the risk of overburdening a rider still in his first season as a professional.
Seixas made the announcement on his team’s social media on May 4.
He won the Tour of the Basque Country in April, becoming the first Frenchman since Christophe Moreau at the 2007 Criterium du Dauphine to claim a WorldTour stage-race title.
The Lyon-born rider, who has said his biggest dream is to win the Tour, is already being seen as a potential answer to France’s long wait for a first home victor since Bernard Hinault in 1985.
Team management had indicated that Seixas’ programme would be assessed after the Ardennes classics, where he won the Fleche Wallonne before being beaten only by world champion Tadej Pogacar in the Liege-Bastogne-Liege race.
The 2026 Tour starts in Barcelona on July 4 and finishes in Paris on July 26. REUTERS
