As the youngest-ever winner of La Flèche Wallonne, Paul Seixas (Decathlon CMA CGM) has set up a mouth-watering Liège-Bastogne-Liège face-off with Tadej Pogačar (UAE Team Emirates-XRG) and Remco Evenepoel (Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe) this Sunday.
Seixas became only the second rider in history to win the mid-week Ardennes Classic on debut, after Marc Hirschi, with his team putting on a masterclass and making the race hard, before he scorched his way up the Mur de Huy in the third fastest time ever.
Even his own team staff are running out of words for what he is doing at 19 years of age. After all, it even took Pogačar four attempts to conquer La Flèche Wallonne. They’re getting more excited by the race day for Seixas’ prospects, and why shouldn’t they?
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“Paul finished it off magically. That he does this at 19 is incredible. He is a great champion like Tadej Pogačar and Remco Evenepoel, men who can win stage races and one-day races. The future looks bright for him.”
Jurdie didn’t hold back with his praise of the young French star, who will start only his second Monument at Liège-Bastogne-Liège – a race he won as a junior two years ago – as one of the favourites and the rider most expected to follow Pogačar’s inevitable attacks.
“I currently do not have the level to beat Pogačar. But I do train to become the best. And you have to work for that and then prove yourself in races.”
Having proved himself today on the vicious slopes of the Mur de Huy, he still kept that caution, knowing full well the different beast represented by Pogačar, from whom he felt the full brunt at Strade Bianche, where he impressed in second, but could only follow him momentarily.
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