Evenepoel absence only adds to Seixas' burden at Flèche Wallonne

Cycling’s top table has become increasingly populated by young phenomena over the past decade, but nobody, not even Evenepoel, has had quite as precocious a rise as the Frenchman. Evenepoel was already in his 20s before he lined up as a bona fide contender to win a Classic, at his fateful outing at Il Lombardia in 2020, while Tadej Pogačar made no impression on his teenaged Ardennes debut in 2019.

Seixas, by contrast, lines up for his first Flèche Wallonne off the back of his scorching of the earth at Itzulia Basque Country, where he won three stages and cruised to a resounding overall victory, mastering the terrain, the notorious conditions and the pressures of leadership with striking ease.

That performance, allied to his second place behind Pogačar at Strade Bianche, has heightened speculation about how much closer he might get to the world champion at Liège-Bastogne-Liège on Sunday. Seixas, after all, seems to be improving exponentially before our eyes, week after week. 

With good reason, journalist Daniel Friebe has likened Seixas’ repeated leaps forward this Spring to Damiano Cunego’s dramatic rise this time 22 years ago, a sequence that culminated in a youthful Giro d’Italia victory.

But before his rendezvous with Pogačar and Evenepoel at the weekend, Seixas faces an arguably more demanding task on Wednesday, at least from a psychological standpoint. With no Pogačar and Evenepoel in the field, anything less than a win from Seixas will be viewed as a disappointment in some quarters, as ludicrous as that seems.

For reference, the youngest winner in Flèche Wallonne history is Philémon De Meersman, who was 21 years and 150 days old when he claimed victory in 1936. When Marc Hirschi won the race aged 22 six years ago, he was the youngest winner since Eddy Merckx back in 1967.

What Seixas is trying to do here, therefore, is in no way normal and it shouldn’t be taken for granted. 

In the Basque Country, the raw numbers of Seixas’ power-to-weight ratio on the climbs repeatedly made the difference. He’ll be able to lean on those preternatural gifts again on Wednesday, but even though Flèche Wallonne is inevitably decided on the Mur de Huy, the final climb is only one part of the equation. Positioning in the finale and, above all, at the foot of the Mur de Huy, are fundamental, and so too is the timing of the final attack. 

Even the best Mur men of the 21st century – Alejandro Valverde, Julian Alaphilippe and the late Davide Rebellin – needed a few sighters before they mastered the intricacies of that famous S-bend and that tantalising finish line that seems to hover just out of view for something like an eternity. Sage judgement as well as stratospheric watts are required here. 

If Seixas were to conquer the Mur de Huy at the first attempt, it would mark his most astonishing achievement yet. And, inevitably, it would only amplify the clamour for him to aim higher and higher in 2026.

The Tour de France – and, more specifically, France’s four decades (and counting) of hurt – has been the background music to Seixas’ cycling life. Even before he turned professional with Decathlon CMA CGM, he was spoken of as the chosen one of French cycling, and that status has only been cemented over the past 18 months. 

Even Thibaut Pinot, who carried French hopes from an absurdly young age, didn’t feature on the cover of L’Équipe until he had won a stage of the Tour in 2012, and the stories suggesting he might eventually win the whole thing didn’t really start until he’d reached Paris in 10th overall.

Seixas, by contrast, already made the front of L’Équipe after his victory at the Ardèche Classic in February, nudging Paris Saint-Germain to the inside pages, and he was given the honour again when he dominated Itzulia Basque Country, where the headline doubled as an invitation to make his Tour debut this year: “Yellow suits him so well.”

L’Équipe, like the Tour itself, is owned by the Amaury Group, but the open come-and-get-me pleas haven’t been restricted to the race’s official newspaper. The Tour director himself has been dropping increasingly unsubtle calls for Seixas to line up in July.

Two weeks ago, Christian Prudhomme let slip to RMC Sport that he “dreamt” of a sprint between Seixas and Pogačar at Liège-Bastogne-Liège, which, like Flèche, is also part of the ASO stable. 

Earlier this week, meanwhile, Prudhomme told a podcast that he believed there was a “90% chance” that Seixas would ride the Tour, and he seemed keen to give him the final nudge in that direction, despite his tender years: “Times have changed. The riders of 15 and 16 years of age today train like riders of 20 or 21 did a few years ago.” 

It is a quite remarkable state of affairs for a Tour director to court a rider so publicly. This kind of thing is usually the preserve of Giro and Vuelta directors; the Tour has always seen itself as being far above such overtures. Indeed, back in 2008, Prudhomme and ASO declined to invite defending champion Alberto Contador to their race due to the doping record of his Astana team, reasoning that the Tour made the riders and not vice-versa. 

Throughout his tenure, Prudhomme has generally played the part of the grown-up in the room of pro cycling politics, rarely putting a word askew in his role as the front man for the sport’s biggest race. It says something about the hype around Seixas that even the usually sober Prudhomme is not immune to its excesses. 

What hope has Seixas of escaping it?

He’ll just have to live with it, and so far, he’s managed that just fine. After all, Seixas was already the unbackable favourite at the Tour de l’Avenir last year after placing in the top 10 at the Dauphiné earlier in the summer. Anything less than victory would have been deemed a failure, but he shouldered the pressure and delivered.

The absence of Evenepoel and Pogačar only adds to the expectations heaped upon Seixas at Flèche Wallonne. That weight, more than rivals like Mattias Skjelmose (Lidl-Trek) or Benoît Cosnefroy (UAE Team Emirates-XRG), might well prove Seixas’ toughest opponent here. And if he wins Flèche despite that burden, of course, those Tour calls will only grow louder.