{"id":1067291,"date":"2026-07-04T04:33:14","date_gmt":"2026-07-04T04:33:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/1067291\/"},"modified":"2026-07-04T04:33:14","modified_gmt":"2026-07-04T04:33:14","slug":"paul-seixas-enters-tour-de-france-with-pressure-of-national-drought","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/1067291\/","title":{"rendered":"Paul Seixas Enters Tour de France With Pressure of National Drought"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n\tIt\u2019s been 41 years since a French rider last won the Tour de France<\/a>. In that stretch, national cycling prodigies have come and gone, but none have carried the hype of Paul Seixas, who is making his much anticipated debut this week on the sport\u2019s biggest stage. <\/p>\n

\n\tThe 19-year-old Seixas, who is the third favorite in this year\u2019s race, is looking to accomplish something virtually unheard-of in pro cycling. It\u2019s been more than 120 years since a teenager won one of cycling\u2019s three Grand Tours. In fact, he\u2019s the youngest Tour de France rider since 1937. As many sports get younger and younger, cycling has remained an old(er) man\u2019s game.<\/p>\n

\n\tFriday\u2019s Club Sportico<\/a> essay explores the struggles of French cyclists at the eponymous three-week race, and why Seixas (pronounced \u201csecs-ahhs\u201d) is just one piece of a sizable effort (and sizable investment) to reverse the country\u2019s fortunes. New money from a pair of French companies\u2014one in sporting goods, the other in shipping and logistics\u2014has created optimism that the 41-year drought could soon be a thing of the past.<\/p>\n

\n\tHere is an excerpt of that\u00a0essay<\/a> \u270d\ufe0f:<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cTheories abound as to why French cyclists (and French teams) have struggled so much in the sport\u2019s biggest event. Some of it is definitely financial\u2014as a handful of teams have dramatically increased the money they spend on talent, analytics and equipment, French teams have been largely left behind. There\u2019s also a quirk of French labor law that requires athletes<\/a> and staffers to be full-time employees, which creates a tax burden that doesn\u2019t hit other teams that treat theirs as part-time contractors.<\/p>\n

\n\tOn top of that, some cycling experts believe French athletes and teams are culturally less willing to make all the sacrifices necessary to build a Grand Tour contender. By some twisted logic, that may also include an aversion to doping.<\/p>\n

\n\tSeixas is now the backbone of a much broader movement to change things (you could even call it a revolution). He\u2019s currently employed by Decathlon CMA CGM, a French team that was sold<\/a> in the middle of last year\u2019s Tour de France. A French sportswear brand, Decathlon said at the time that it was planning to spend $47 million (40 million Euros) per year on the team\u2014that\u2019s still less than the biggest teams, but a dramatic jump up from the ~$33 million (\u20ac28 million)\u00a0that the team and its French peers had spent in prior years. A few weeks later, French shipping and logistics giant CMA CGM signed on<\/a> for five years, providing a sizable cash infusion.<\/p>\n

\n\tIf you\u2019re an MLB fan, think of Decathlon CMA CGM as the San Diego Padres. They\u2019re not spending up with the sport\u2019s top dogs, but they\u2019re hoping to find success by investing more than the fat middle of their competition. Another point of comparison might be the New York Knicks, who just overcame their fans\u2019 own concerns about cultural issues plaguing the franchise to snap a decades-long drought. Bigger-spending teams outside of France will likely to try to poach Seixas if he doesn\u2019t re-sign with Decathlon before next year, amping up the pressure.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"It\u2019s been 41 years since a French rider last won the Tour de France. In that stretch, national…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":1067292,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[5309],"tags":[2000,299,36,253421,26364,20680],"class_list":["post-1067291","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-france","tag-eu","tag-europe","tag-france","tag-nbc-sports","tag-peacock","tag-tour-de-france"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/116859843824516247","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1067291","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1067291"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1067291\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1067292"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1067291"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1067291"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1067291"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}