Extreme tour preparation: Paul Seixas climbs 43,000 metres in a fortnight

Unlike other professional cyclists, the 19-year-old Frenchman from Team Decathlon CMA CGM publishes all his training sessions on Strava. A look at his profile shows an extremely tough training block. In the last two weeks, he has mainly been collecting metres in altitude in Spain around Grenada. He covered around 43,000 metres of altitude in 14 days - that's almost as much as the entire Giro d'Italia. Spread over the days, his altitude metre collection looked like this:

Paul Seixas collects climbing kilometres

The plan shows only two days on which he gained fewer metres in altitude. The highlight was 6,255 metres of altitude on day 14 on a tour that was around 200 kilometres long. He was not slow on his tours: on many tours he collected the crown for the fastest time. On the long ride, he collected almost 200 awards on Strava. This is relevant because many professional cyclists train in the region - most recently the Visma | Lease a Bike team, among others. He rode the 200 kilometres at an average speed of 29.1 km/h and didn't dawdle on the descents either: Strava recorded an alarming 93.6 km/h. The training programme is amazing because it takes place at high altitude. However, the increase over the course of the training camp suggests that the coaching team closely monitored how Paul Seixas coped with the strain.

Kilometres travelled:

France's great Tour hope

If everything goes as planned, Paul Seixas will be the youngest participant in the Tour de France since 1937. The 19-year-old from Lyon has never competed in a Grand Tour before. He is only in his second year as a professional cyclist and made a sensational start in 2026. His stage win at the Tour of the Algarve (2nd place overall) was followed by his second place at Strade Bianche behind Tadej Pogacar. Shortly afterwards he won the Tour of the Basque Country, Flèche Wallonne and finally finished second in Liège-Bastogne-Liège. In that race, he was the last rider to keep Pogacar's rear wheel until almost the end. In the French media, he is described as either a piece of gold or a phenomenon and the podcasts are full of praise. Comparisons were quickly made with Bernard Hinault - the last French winner of the Tour de France. France's desire for a French Tour winner is great and has been a heavy burden for some strong riders in recent years. France has been hoping for a Frenchman to win again since 1985.