There was something in the air on the Markstein, amid the smoke rising from sausage-laden barbecues and the mist swirling to cleanse the mountainside after each blast of sudden, torrential rain. The crowds had cycled and hiked up in their thousands, and only a narrow strip of road was available amid the thick tunnel of fans on the final climb of the Col du Haag.
Paul Seixas had ridden a quiet race up to this point, but this atmosphere simply demanded he roar into life.
And so he did. For the first real time in this Tour de France, the 19-year-old prodigy, the great French hope, truly connected with the home crowds and sent their pulses racing.
Tadej Pogačar flew the nest once again, and it’s clear that Seixas is not fighting for the yellow jersey, but the way he set about chasing down, and then sprinting away from, Jonas Vingegaard (Visma-Lease a Bike) seemed to change the whole outlook of his race in a flash.
Seixas was outsprinted by Pogačar’s UAE Team Emirates-XRG teammate, Isaac del Toro, who came back, hitched a ride, and snatched second place, but the Frenchman took third place on the day and climbed two places to fourth overall.
He also grabbed the white jersey of best young rider from Juan Ayuso (Lidl-Trek), which he says is not on his mind but it nevertheless carried some significance here. It meant that, for the first time, he stepped onto the podium at a Tour de France finish, looking out over the adoring fans, and also going through the post-stage podium and media protocols for the first of surely many times.
“It’s incredible, I’m living a dream,” Seixas said.
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“The Tour is magnificently hard, let’s say. It was a very difficult day, but I’m starting to get used to that on the Tour – it’s very tough. That’s really what has struck me, but I’ve trained hard for that, the team has worked hard for that. It’s really a pleasure to have this white jersey and to be really in the race for the podium.”
Seixas was not getting too carried away, but the rest of France was.
Nestled among the crowds on the Markstein was the open-air France Télévisions studio, where several former French pros waxed lyrical about what they’d just seen.
“To hell with Tadej Pogačar today,” yelled former yellow jersey wearer Thomas Voeckler, to great cheers from those gathered around the studio.
“What the fans experienced today, what Paul Seixas experienced today… there was a taste of it on the Tourmalet, but this was on another level.
“He went after the wheel of Vingegaard and it was the fans that allowed him to do that. He has won races but he has never known that support that allows to go and search for those last metres. It’s the first time he feels that, but absolutely not the last.”
On the morning of stage 14, we ran a story on Paul Seixas and the quieter, more conservative approach being taken by the sparkling 19-year-old in his debut Tour de France – and it’s a good job we published it when we did, because by the end of the day it was somewhat out-dated.
Seixas had already been mightily impressive – let’s make no mistake about that – but as his Decathlon CMA CGM director Luke Rowe pointed out, he has dialled back his more aggressive instincts in what is his first three-week race.
There is still a long way to go, and not every day can be like this one, but it certainly felt like this was a crucial moment in the arc of Paul Seixas’ debut Tour.
“Naturally, this gives me confidence for what’s to come. The Tour is still long, the hardest part is yet to come, so I remain pragmatic. There’s still a lot to do.
“There was an unknown over the second and third weeks of racing. We’re not yet in the third week so let’s be careful. But I’ve trained very hard for this. Recovery is the most important thing now but we’ve worked a lot on that, we’ve done some extremely hard training camps, so we know what the efforts are like and how to recover.
“For now it’s going well and if it can continue like this it would be great.”
While Seixas is managing to keep his feet on the ground, he may well find them lifted off it if this atmosphere continues in what remains of this Tour.
“I think he’s going to be carried by the whole of France,” said Laurent Jalabert.
“Seixas mania has begun,” responded Voeckler.
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