White jersey lead and Pogačar's praise confirm Seixas's status at the Tour de France

The Tour de France has a new white jersey after Saturday's stage 14. French top talent Paul Seixas took it over from Juan Ayuso, and the Decathlon rider could hardly believe it afterward. What’s next for Seixas? In any case, the comments of stage winner Tadej Pogačar confirm the status this top talent already commands in the Tour de France peloton.

Ayuso was wearing the white jersey at the start of the fourteenth stage, but ultimately couldn’t keep up when Vingegaard and Seixas (behind Pogačar) accelerated. The Frenchman ultimately finished third in the stage standings, 38 seconds behind the world champion. But he was also 6 seconds (10 if you count the time bonuses) ahead of Evenepoel and 12 seconds (16 if you count the time bonuses) ahead of Ayuso.

As a result, Seixas is now not only the leader in the youth classification but also the new No. 4 in the overall standings. “It’s really quite unbelievable, actually,” he told IDL Pro Cycling and others after the race. “I’m truly living a dream. That’s really cool, so I hope it continues tomorrow.”

And yet, for a brief moment, it looked as though he would have to let Vingegaard go. “I tried to pace myself, but above all, I have to thank my team. They did an absolutely incredible job of setting my pace. After that, I felt good the whole day. I stayed mentally focused, and that ultimately paid off.”

That’s for a rider who hasn’t raced a single Grand Tour in his career. “Of course, there was an element of the unknown about these two or three weeks of racing. By the way, we’re not even in the third week yet, so watch out.” Still, the Frenchman wasn’t worried. “People need to realize that we’re professional cyclists.”

What does that mean? “We train really hard; we do three-week high-altitude training camps, and we manage to get through them. I’ve also built up my endurance, because I’ve focused more on endurance training this year than last year, so I’m recovering better than I did last year. We’ll see what that yields over the next few days.”

Pogačar, the yellow jersey wearer, was asked about Seixas and how he viewed the Frenchman. The world champion had a brilliant analysis in store. He thought back to late April. “When Paul followed me on La Redoute, in Liège–Bastogne–Liège, it gave me a little extra motivation for the Tour.”

Pogačar was taken aback by Seixas’s level of performance. “I was really thinking: ‘Whoa, this young guy is going to give me trouble in the Tour.’ After that, I was really focused on preparing for the Tour. It might have given me an extra push.” So it remained to be seen how this top talent would hold his own in the Tour peloton, but his status is give a boost by such high praise from Pogačar.