Teenagers are no longer just “making up the numbers” in pro cycling. From Paul Seixas and Albert Withen Philipsen to Joshua Tarling, the new wave is arriving earlier, skipping U23 entirely and sometimes thriving, sometimes burning out.
Nowadays in almost every single race we find at least one if not multiple teenagers. And they’re not just riding at the back, they’re up there competing against the best of the best. For example, just take a look at how Paul Seixas has performed so far this year.
The craziest thing however, is that even though he’s only 19 years old, this is already his second season amongst the pros. Skipping the U23 category entirely is quite a rare thing, usually only a couple of riders do it per year.
The first rider to ever do it was Remco Evenepoel back in 2019, and well, we all know how that one turned out. However, not everyone had the same success as the Belgian.
So with that in mind, I thought it would be a good idea to take a look at all the riders who tried to do the same as Remco.
We’ll talk about their junior years, their transition into the WT peloton and whether going pro early has actually benefitted them. So with that being said, let’s jump into it!
Right after Remco set this new precedent, two other riders followed in his footsteps, one of them being Carlos Rodríguez. As a junior Carlos rode for Polartec-Kometa Junior Team, which is owned by the infamous Alberto Contandor. Carlos’ results were so good, particularly in stage races, that many people thought he could be Spain’s next big GC rider.
So it wasn’t a huge surprise when Ineos picked him up and dropped him into straight into the deep end the in the following year. But as we know, 2020 was a strange year, to say the least. What Carlos needed was experience and kilometers, but thanks to Covid he got none of the two. He had to skip a year, which might not be a problem for many WT riders, but for a teenager who needs development in all aspects was a clear disadvantage.
But even after this unfortunate setback, he clearly improved in the following year. In May he finished 4th in the GC at the Vuelta a Andalucia, beating the likes of Tom Skujins and Ethan Hayter and he also got 3rd at the Spanish National Championships-ITT in late June. Both of these results showed that he has immense potential as a GC rider. So going into his main objective, which was the Tour de l’Avenir, expectations towards him were understandably very high. But even with all this pressure on his shoulders, he delivered.
He was very consistent from start to finish, even won the last stage which was the hardest, but in the end he just fell short in the GC to Tobias Halland Johannessen by 7 seconds. Yes, he was probably disappointed that he couldn’t pull it off, however in the grand scheme of things, his season was a huge success. In 2022 he continued this upwards trajectory. He finished in the top 10 of multiple general classifications, and even rode his first Grand Tour (the Vuelta), where he finished 6th. And don’t forget, he achieved all of this as a 21 year old.
In the following year he finished 5th at the Tour, where he probably would’ve finished on the podium if not for a nasty crash in the last week. Since then his career has been going up and down, mostly thanks to injuries and crashes. But it seems like that this year he found his rhythm again, which hopefully means that he’ll be back to his old level when the big races come. Overall, the decision to go straight into the WT might’ve been a year too early for him, but no one knew what would happen in 2020.
So considering the circumstances, I think Carlos did the right thing, and the early setback probably made him even stronger from a psychological point of view, which is at least as important for cyclists as their performances on the road.
The other rider to replicate this unprecedented thing in 2020 was Quinn Simmons. Looking at his results in the junior categories, you could make the argument that he was an even bigger talent than Carlos. He dominated in every race, no matter the terrain or the opponents.
He ended his junior career on high by winning the World Championships in Richmond by a whopping 56 seconds. As a consequence, he finished 2nd in the yearly junior rankings, only behind the German Marco Brenner, who we’ll talk about later. So it seemed like a sensible move for him to ride for Lidl-Trek in his first professional year.
The biggest American prodigy riding for the most prestigious American team. Sounds like a match made in heaven, right? Well, in 2020 he had to deal with the same thing as Carlos, but unlike the Spaniard he still showed why he was the reigning junior world champion, by finishing 2nd at the Tour of Hungary. In the following year he continued his steady progression.
He rode races such as Strade Bianche, Paris-Roubaix or the Ronde van Vlaanderen, where he gained a huge amount of experience. He got his second stage race victory, by winning the Tour de Wallonie.
Later that year he also rode his first Grand Tour (the Vuelta), where he was agonizingly close to stage win. He was in the breakaway on stage 19, which proved to be a successful one, however he lost the sprint to Magnus Cort and Rui Oliveira. But considering that he had just turned 20 earlier that year, his future looked really bright. But for some reason, his progress stalled in the next 3 years.
Yes, he won a stage at the Vuelta San Juan and he also became American champion for the first time in his career, but as a former junior world champion and the talent he was considered to be, his results were quite underwhelming.
Only Quinn knows the reasons behind the stall in his development, but if I had to guess, he probably wasn’t satisfied being a domestique in every race he rode. So entering 2025, Lidl-Trek knew that they had to change something, and luckily for Quinn, they did.
He finally got the freedom to ride for himself, and he immediately took the opportunity. He won a couple of breakaway stages at the Volta Catalunya and at the Tour de Suisse. After that he became national champion for the second time in his career. He was so close to a stage win at the Tour as well, only Ben Healy could beat him on stage 6.
After all this you’d think that he probably slowed down towards the end of the year, but he proved everybody wrong and showed that he can consistently perform at high level. Just look at his last race of the year, Il Lombardia. He finished 4th, after being in the breakaway for more than 200 kilometers.
So, was it a good decision for him to turn pro early?
Personally, I think he was talented enough to go toe-to-toe with the big guns right away, but he clearly had a couple of hard years due to how his team approached him as a rider. This is a perfect example, that even if a young rider is talented and disciplined, they still need a team that believes in them right from the start. And who knows where the American could be, if he had all that.
As we know by know, Simmons ended his junior season 2nd in the rankings. The one rider to finish ahead of him was non-other than Marco Brenner. What is even more impressive, that he achieved all of that in his first year inside the junior ranks.
He was consistent all throughout the year and he pretty much won every race he took part in. He rode for the team now known as Team-Grenke Auto Eder, which was and still is the best junior team out there. Unfortunately, in 2020 the juniors had almost no races due to the pandemic, however what he showed as a first year junior was still enough to get him a pro contract at Team DSM. However, missing a year clearly put him behind the pro peloton.
Don’t forget, he was still only a teenager, who now had to race amongst the pros with almost no race experience. And as you’d expect, things didn’t go well, not just that year, but in all the three years he spent riding for DSM. He was a non-factor in every race he participated in. But how could a German not perform in a familiar environment, you could ask. Well, many former DSM riders were very critical about the German side after they had left.
Riders such as Jai Hindley, Marc Hirschi or Ilan Van Wilder were clearly dissatisfied with how the team operated when they were riding for the German outfit. So in my opinion it’s no surprise that they couldn’t get the most out of an inexperienced racer like Marco. As a consequence he left the team in 2024 and joined Tudor Pro Cycling. On the one hand, it was a step back, since Tudor was and still is only a Continental Team, but on the other hand Brenner definitely needed a big change of environment. He started with a clean slate, no one really considered him a super talent anymore so he had zero pressure on his shoulders. And looking back now, probably that was what he exactly needed.
He didn’t achieve any spectacular results, but a 5th place in the GC at both the Czech Tour and the Tour of Norway were at least something to build on. He also became national champion that year by beating Florian Lipowitz, who as we know has turned out to be a pretty good bike rider. In the following year (2025), he had very similar results, the best probably being a 2nd place at the Faun-Ardéche Classic. So by the end of the year, even his believers started to doubt if he would ever become the rider he was once destined to be. Unexpectedly, he started this year well, by getting a 4th place in GC at the Tour Down Under.
He then carried his great form into the European one-day hilly classics, showing that his performance in the Southern Hemisphere wasn’t just a fluke. Him and Tudor will be hoping that he can keep up his good form for the rest of the year, because if he can, then something special might just be on the horizon. He will probably never become a household name, mostly due to the influences of the pandemic and DSM’s bad culture, which is a shame, because his first junior year is still one of the most impressive to date. Fortunately, no one else decided to turn pro early in 2021, so the effects of the pandemic “only” had an effect on these 3 highly regarded juniors.
A German, signed by a German team, sounds familiar, doesn’t it. When Bora announced the signing of Luis-Joe Lührs, a lot of people were confused, including me. Don’t get me wrong, Luis was still talented and definitely had some untapped potential, but compared to the other riders on this list, he was at least one if not more steps down as a prospect.
Just like Brenner, he rode for Team-Grenke, but he wasn’t even the best rider in the team, let alone in the world. His results were good, but not anything to wipe our head around. He got a couple of 2nd places at two hilly one-day races and won a stage at the Ain Bugey Valromey Tour. However he was nowhere in the GC, which showed that next to the top-end performance he still lacked consistency too.
So then why did Bora rush him into the pros, you could ask? Well, in my opinion they desperately wanted a German GC rider. And don’t forget, the year before they missed out on Brenner, who was regarded by many as the next big German cyclist. For the team it was a low risk-high reward signing. However, for the rider it was the move that in hindsight probably caused his early retirement. But before we discuss that, let’s just go back a bit and look at his results.
But being honest, there is nothing really to talk about. In the 3 years he spent riding for Bora, he didn’t achieve a single Top10 in road races, his best results was probably the 13th place he got at the German National Championships road race back in 2022. So it was no surprise that he parted ways with the German side at the end of his contract (2024). But would anybody be interested in signing a rider with the kind of results he had? Well, not the professional teams, that’s for sure. As consequence, he got picked up by Decathlon’s development team. It was a clear step back, but also a chance for him to prove himself in a new environment.
Speaking of the environment, Decathlon’s U23 team is probably one of the best at developing young talents, so on paper Lührs had everything around him to get better.
However, he just couldn’t perform, not even in the U23 races. But still, it was a huge surprise to see him suddenly retire at the end of the year, at the age of 22. I don’t want to speculate on the reasons behind his retirement, but throwing him straight into the deep end was definitely a rushed decision by Bora.
Back in 2022, Bora didn’t just sign one teenager, they hedged their bets by signing Cian Uijtdebroeks next to Lührs. However, as oppose to the German, Cian’s results were actually outstanding. The Belgian was dominant on every terrain throughout the year, including the individual time trials as well. At the end of the year he finished 3rd in the junior rankings, which showed that he was capable to perform at a high level from start to finish. So it was no surprise that the Belgians started to call him the next Remco Evenepoel. And after he decided to skip the U23 category, these comparisons became even more common in the media.
As a consequence, the expectations towards him were extremely high, even though he was still a teenager. Most athletes would’ve collapsed under this pressure, but Cian was an exception. In stage races such as the Tour of Norway and the Sibiu Tour, he was already competing for the win, which he would eventually get at the Tour de l’Avenir later that year. He was only the fourth Belgian in history to win the GC, and also the youngest winner since Tadej Pogacar who won back in 2018. And in the following year, he made another step as a GC rider. He was able to transfer his stage racing performances from the Pro Tour into the World Tour.
His best performance came at the Vuelta later that year, where he finished 8th in the GC, cementing himself as a true stage racer. And the Remco comparisons got even more louder after the 13th stage. If you remember, that was the stage in which Evenepoel collapsed early on the Col d’Aubisque, while his compatriot finished 5th on the infamous Col du Tourmalet. After that day, everybody knew that Cian was the real deal, including the rivals of Bora. And one of those rivals by the name of Visma didn’t hesitate, they decided to buy the Belgium out of his existing contract. So he started the new season in the team, that has just won all three Grand Tours in the previous one.
His main objective for the year was the Giro and the Vuelta. In Italy he looked very strong, even wore the white jersey at the end of the first week, however he had to withdraw from the race due to a Covid infection. At the Vuelta his shape was clearly off, he wasn’t himself and ended up abandoning the race after stage 15. Unfortunately, he continued to struggle in the following year too, which indicated that it wasn’t just bad form anymore, he clearly had an other problem. Finally, after the Tirreno, him and Visma announced that he had a serious back problem, which required surgery. He returned to racing in the summer and immediately performed.
He won a stage and the GC at the Tour de l’Ain, finished 2nd at the Czech Tour and ended the year with a 10th place at Il Lombardia. But even after these impressive results, Visma decided that they weren’t going give him sole leadership at one of the Grand Tours in 2026.
Hence why the Belgian decided to leave the Dutch outfit and sign for Movistar, where he would get the opportunity to be the GC leader at the Tour de France. However, his bad luck with injuries continued, when he fractured his elbow on his debut with the Spanish team in Valenciana. So now he is out, but not for long as he is scheduled to ride Volta a Catalunya, which starts in 2 weeks. But, has he lived up to the expectations that were set towards him as a teenager? It’s a hard question, as he is still only 23 with a lot of time left. In my opinion, Bora were right to sign him early, but in hindsight his move to Visma was probably a mistake, as he’s never got an opportunity to be the team’s sole leader.
In 2023 another couple of riders decided to make the jump straight into the WT. Interestingly, both of them were signed by Ineos, which wasn’t really a surprise if we look at how the British team operated back then. Their goal was clear: sign the next TDF winner who can bring back the success they had in the late 2010s. However, in 2023 they still didn’t have a development team, which meant that if they had wanted to sign a junior rider, then that rider would have to ride for the WT team.
By not having a development team they also missed out on British talents such as Onley, Brennan and Max Poole, as they still wanted to ride at least a year in the U23s. So their team structure was definitely not the ideal one. But who were the two youngsters they signed? One of them was Joshua Tarling, a true phenomenon against the clock. In his junior years he rode for Team Flanderscolor, a Belgian side that is famous for having British riders on their team.
Josh was a very complete rider as a teenager and his skill on two wheels extended to a variety of disciplines – he won European junior titles in the omnium and team pursuit on the track. He took several wins in 2022 that set him up for his biggest challenge to date, the UCI World Championships in Wollongong, Australia, where he took his first rainbow jersey, winning the men’s junior individual time trial. This was the win that eventually earned him the contract with the Grenadiers. Entering his first year as a pro, expectations towards him were sky high. Experts, the media and even casual fans were sure that he was going to be a prolific winner. There was only one question: how many races could he actually win?
The answer was: a lot, and they weren’t just small ones either. The Brit displayed his superior skill against the clock, taking his first senior title at the British nationals, before claiming the bronze medal at the UCI Cycling World Championships in Glasgow. He also got his maiden WT win by winning the ITT at the Renewi Tour. However, his biggest achievement came at the European Championships in Emmen, where he became the youngest rider ever to win the ITT. On that day he beat the likes of Wout van Aert and Bissegger, two of the very best in that discipline. He showed that people were right about him, he was truly a generational talent.
The next year, which was an Olympic year, he continued to perform in the TTs while also developing as a classics rider, highlighted by a 6th place at the Dwars door Vlaanderen. Unfortunately in Paris he suffered a puncture early on and although he managed to make up time over the course, fell just out of contention and finished fourth. Last year he made another step forward by winning the first TT at the Giro. So, after all this success, what should be his goals for this year?
In my opinion, he has all the tools to do well in the northern cobbled classics, especially at Roubaix, so performing well there should be a priority for him. His other main goal should be the ITT at the World Championships, since that’s a race he hasn’t won yet. All in all, Ineos were definitely right in signing him straight to the WT, although with the talent he possessed, it was always going to be hard for him to fail.
As I’ve said previously, Ineos signed another junior next to the TT sensation. However, the rider I’m about to mention was far from Tarling’s results and performances. Let me introduce you Michael Leonard, a Canadian who was definitely unproven as a junior, to say the least. He came to Europe quite late, in 2022 to be precise, hence why he only rode 3 races that year, including the Junior World Champs held in Wollongong.
The other two races he took part in were a couple of one-day races in Italy. He finished in the Top10 on both occasions, but only having 3 races at the end of his junior career was worrisome to some of the WT teams. That’s why it was a huge shock when Ineos signed him. Leonard was a typical example of a rider who still needed at least one if not two years before becoming professional. He would’ve gained some valuable experience by racing in the U23 category, and he probably would’ve been a lot more successful as well.
But as I’ve already told you, the Grenadiers didn’t have a development team back then, so he had to step into the pro peloton with just only three race days in his legs. So in hindsight it wasn’t a huge surprise that his days as a Grenadier were underwhelming. He spent 3 years wearing the colors of Ineos, in which time his best results was a 10th place in a prologue at the Tour de l’Avenir. He was just simply uncompetitive in all the races he participated in, so he had to move on in order to save his career.
But what teams would be interested in a rider who clearly had problems on the bike, while off it was struggling to get used to life in Europe. Luckily for Michael, there was a certain North American team that still saw something in him.
Off course, I’m talking about EF, a team that is not afraid to invest into the unproven youth. They signed Leonard to a 3 year deal, which means that the Canadian has a surprisingly lot of time to show that what he is actually capable of. He started the season at the Tour Down Under, where he got a 13th place in the opening prologue. Then in his first race in Europe, which was the Tour de la Provence, he got 19th in the GC. Overall, he’s clearly made a step forward, however he still has a lot of ground to make up if he wants to continue racing at the highest level. That being said, it would be harsh to call him a FLOP, as he was set up to fail at Ineos. A new team, a new start and a successful future? I guess we’ll see.
Andrew August - Ineos Grenadiers (2024)
The Brits however didn’t stop at just two signings, as the following year they picked up another teenager next to Tarling and Leonard. I’m talking about Andrew (AJ) August, who just like Tarling, was a tremendous talent. He pretty much won every race as a junior, except the World Champs, but as a GC prospect that didn’t lower his stock at all. He even finished ahead of a certain French prospect called Paul Seixas, who as we know has turned out to be a pretty good bike rider, to say the least. When Ineos saw all this, they signed him without any hesitance.
The Brits were sure that they found the next stage racing superstar who can dominate in the Grand Tours, just like they envisioned it before. The Americans have also been looking desperately for a new GC hope. As a consequence, the pressure on AJ was extremely high entering his first pro year.
But unlike Tarling, he couldn’t deal with this pressure, at least not in the first couple of years. Don’t get me wrong, he got some okay results, like a 7th place at the Czech Tour and a 5th place at the Tour of Austria, but these results were still way off the expectations people set against him. But how could a GC talent like him not perform in one if not the best GC teams to exist. Well, there are a couple of reasons I can think of.
First of all, in the 2024-25 seasons Ineos were definitely not an attractive team. They still raced like they used to in the 2010s and stuck to their traditional style. However, that was not effective anymore against the likes of UAE and Visma. The other reason behind Andrew’s underperformance could’ve been that he had to move across the Atlantic and get used to a new culture and new training methods in a very short amount of time. These two reasons next to the immense pressure people put on him were definitely too much for the teenager.
However, later in the 2025 season Ineos decided to change their approach. Suddenly they were the ones putting pressure on other teams by sending satellite riders into breakaways and making bold, but aggressive decisions. They also made some radical changes in their staff, like appointing former TDF winner Geraint Thomas as the new Head of Racing or signing Elia Viviani and Daryl Impey as new sport directors. With all these changes, August also had a chance to start with a clean slate, and prove to his new bosses that he belongs to the team. And the American grabbed this new opportunity without any hesitation. He took a stage at his first race already, which was the Volta la Communitat Valenciana, with the likes of Evenepoel, Tiberi and Almeida on the startline.
Then in his next race, at the Tour de la Provence he showed he is willing to work for his teammates. He set a super high pace on the queen stage and did everything in his power to help Carlos Rodríguez win the stage, but in the end the Spanish rider lost the final sprint to Andrew’s compatriot, Matthew Riccitello.
Impressively, August still managed to finish 6th on the stage, where he could’ve definitely competed for the win if he hadn’t had to do the domestique work beforehand. So, will he be Ineos’ next GC talisman who delivers them their first TDF win in almost a decade? That might be a little too ambitious, however if he continues to perform the way he’s been so far this year, he will definitely be a rider to watch as the season goes on. But I think we will always have one question regarding Andrew. How good he could’ve been if Ineos had changed their identity a tiny bit earlier? I guess we’ll never know.
Next to August, there was another teen who decided to turn pro in 2024, and his name might sound familiar to the hardcore cycling fans. Markel Beloki’s father is non other than Joseba Beloki, who finished on the podium of the Tour de France 3 times in the early 2000s.
So it’s no surprise that his son, Markel has also chosen to be a cyclist. In his junior years he raced for a Spanish team called MMR Academy, which is owned by Samuel Sánchez, who actually raced with Markel’s dad when he was riding for Euskaltel-Euskadi.
That’s enough history for today, let’s switch our focus back onto Beloki (the younger one), who wasn’t the biggest talent as a junior. He mostly raced in Spain, where he was quite dominant most of the time, but his results got significantly worse whenever he raced outside of the Iberian-peninsula.
His best results came on the TT bike, he won the Junior Spanish Championships and finished 7th at the Junior European Championships in that particular discipline. He definitely had some talent, but a jump straight into the WT seemed a bit too early. But EF didn’t agree with the public’s perception, they swooped in for the Spaniard. Did his dad and Samuel Sánchez have any influence on the American’s team decision.
Personally, I think they were definitely a reason EF decided to sign Markel, but I don’t want to speculate on things I don’t have insight about. In his first year he showed his talents against the clock, by finishing 2nd at the Spanish National Championships, only behind David De La Cruz.
Other than that, it was overall a pretty underwhelming season for him. In the following year EF decided to send him to some of the more prestigious U23 races in the colors of their development team. One of those was the Tour de Alsace, a race which has been won by the likes of Pinot, Pidcock and Schachmann in the past. And at the end of this 5 day stage race Markel joined this impressive list of riders. He even won the queen stage, which finished on top of the notorious La Planche des Belles Filles.
After this amazing result, EF threw him into the deep end again by sending him to the Vuelta. But unlike in his previous races with the pros, he actually played a role in the race. He was in multiple breakaways and he even got a couple of Top10 placings on two of the mountain stages. It looked like that after almost 2 years he finally got used to life as a pro. Although he didn’t start this season on fire, at the end of the day he is still only 20 years old, who, let’s just be honest for a second, definitely got rushed into the WT.
The consistency is what he is missing the most at the moment, but hopefully that will come naturally as he gets older. But even if he becomes Spain’s next TDF winner (which is very unlikely), I will never understand his or his dad’s or whoever’s decision to skip the U23 category completely.
The last couple of riders that are eligible to be on this list have quite a few things in common. One of those is that both of them worn the Rainbow Jersey as juniors, one in the ITT, while the other one in the road races. The latter one has been described by many as the next Mads Pedersen, and for the right reasons. Albert Philipsen was truly a generational talent in his junior years.
He won everywhere, it didn’t matter whether the road was paved or cobbled or if it was uphill or downhill. As I’ve already mentioned, he won the World Championships too, but he did it as a first year junior, which only 4 riders had done before him, most recently Felix Gall (2015) and Matej Mohoric (2013).
All the World Tour teams wanted to have him on their roster in 2025, and in the end Lidl-Trek were the ones who got to sign the Dane. That’s why he constantly gets compared to his compatriot, Mads Pedersen, as they now ride for the same team next to being from the same country.
The American’s signed him with one goal in mind: let him learn and develop next to Mads and by time he will be ready to takeover as the team’s franchise rider. He began his season down under, where he finished 4th on a stage and came away with the white jersey on his shoulders. He then started to race in Europe, where he also impressed.
A 3rd place at the Tour de Hongrie, a 6th place at the Eschborn-Frankfurt next to an impressive display at the Giro Next Gen were all great results, especially by an 18 year old. Next to all this he also became the youngest winner of Paris-Roubaix Espoirs (the U23 Paris-Roubaix).
However, he was still able to elevate his results by a level at the end of the year. He started off his autumn campaign with a 10th place at the Giro dell’ Emilia, then followed it up with a 2nd place at Tre Valli Varesine, behind non-other than Tadej Pogacar and ended it with a podium at Paris-Tours. Just for a bit of context, in the French race he came agonizingly close to the victory, but got outsmarted by Trentin and Laporte in the final sprint.
Everybody expected him to be competitive, but no one really thought that by the end of the year he would be fighting against the best of the best on a consistent basis. This year he hasn’t had a lot of races yet, but I’m sure that he will continue his growth, and at this rate the sky is really the limit for Albert.
As I’ve already mentioned, there was another rider next to Philipsen who decided to turn professional early in 2025. I don’t think he needs a big introduction, so let’s just start his story. Paul Seixas has started his cycling career offroad, taking part in numerous CX races.
That’s where he got recognized by AG2R, and the French team immediately signed him to their junior team. In his first year he was already winning races left, right and center, and as a consequence he ended the year as the best first year junior in the rankings. As you’d probably have guessed, he won even more in the following year.
Next to all the success he had in the stage races, he also dominated in one-day races such as the junior’s Liége-Bastogne-Liége. This was also the year he won the ITT at the World Championships, which was very impressive considering his rider type.
All these results just confirmed the thing most experts had already known: he was a generational talent, who in the future could become the next French TDF winner. AG2R knew that they had to build around him, if they didn’t want to lose him to the “big boys”. Luckily for them, in 2025 Decathlon decided to get into cycling more deeply, so they became AG2R’s main sponsor, which instantly made the French team one of the wealthier teams in the peloton.
Before the season, Decathlon had a clear plan for Paul: slowly help him transition into pros, by sending him to some smaller races such as the GP Marseillasie, where he finished 5th, before sending him to some of the biggest one-week races, the Critérium du Dauphiné. In between those two he rode some more French one-day races, where he was always in contention for the win and he also took part in the Tour of the Alps, where on the final stage he played a crucial role in Prodhomme’s win. Then came the Dauphiné, where he finished 8th in the GC beating the likes of Sepp Kuss and Carlos Rodríguez.
So after such a successful spring, he was the odds-on favorite heading into the Tour de l’Avenir. And Seixas didn’t just simply win, he dominated, even though there were rumors that he got sick right before the race. But even after all this success, he was still able to elevate his level in his final races. Firstly, he finished 13th on a super demanding course at the World Championships in Rwanda.
Then at the Europeans he got 3rd, finishing ahead of riders such as Juan Ayuso, Skjelmose and Scaroni. And he ended his season on a high, by finishing 7th at Il Lombardia. So entering this year, the French started to label him as the next TDF winner. Many of Paul’s compatriots have collapsed under this label in the past, for example Pinot, Bardet and Gaudu. All the three I just mentioned were expected to eventually be France’s next TDF winner, however they were never able to fully reach their potential, partly due to the public’s pressure. I know it’s still early in the season, but it seems like Seixas might just be the “Messiah” the French have been waiting for. He started the year on fire by winning a stage in Algarve and finishing 2nd in the GC.
Then at the Faun-Ardéche Classic he dropped everybody off his wheel and won by a whopping 1:48 ahead of Jan Christen. However, this was still nowhere near as impressive as his performance at Strade. He dared to follow Tadej Pogacar, but as expected he got dropped a few minutes after the Slovenian’s first attack. But he didn’t give up, instead he was attacking in almost every gravel sector.
All this commitment earned him a 2nd place, beating the likes of Del Toro, Grégoire and Pidcock. So, what’s next for the French sensation? Well, he will most likely ride the Tour in June, where he should be a contender for the podium. Another question that has been circling around is whether he stays at Decathlon after his contract runs out in 2027? In my opinion, at the moment the French team is where he is most likely to win the Tour.
They are clearly building everything around him, and it would be also pretty lovely to see a French rider succeed in a French team. On the other hand I guess it would be hard to say no to a team like UAE. One thing is for sure, this guy is an extraordinary talent, and will win a lot of races, regardless which team he rides for.
In 2026 there will be only one rider who turns pro early. I’m talking about Mattia Agostinacchio, a true all-rounder who is capable to perform on any terrain.
He started his career as a CX rider, and he pretty much won everything he could in that discipline. Then he transitioned into road cycling, where he also showed that he is an exceptional talent. So it was no surprise that many WT teams were after his signature, and in the end EF were the ones who picked him up. But instead of moving him into their U23 team, they decided to give Mattia a WT contact straight away.
He rode multiple CX races this winter, hence why he hasn’t made his debut yet on the road. Speaking of his debut, he is set to ride the Coppi e Bartali as his first race. He is a huge talent, but there are definitely some things he needs to work on if he wants to follow riders like Seixas or Albert Philipsen later in his career. And I’m aware that we are still only at the start of 2026, however we already know that at least one rider will follow in Mattia’s footsteps in 2027. I’m speaking of Benjamin Noval, who is set to ride for Ineos in the upcoming season.
His father, who is also called Benjamin Noval, rode for teams like Astana and Tinkoff in the 2010s, and now is a sports director at MMR Academy, the team which his son currently rides for. Noval (the younger one) had a very successful first junior year. He dominated the Spanish races and he was also quite successful abroad, which made him the 3rd best rider born in 2008 at the end of calendar year.
These performances earned him a WT contract with Ineos for the 2027 season, but before that he still has one year to develop and gain experience in the junior ranks. It’s still early to say where his ceiling is as a rider, but he is on the right track to become Spain’s next superstar.
Article written and produced by Ákos Derdák (Instagram, X)
Photos: SprintCyclingAgency
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