Tadej Pogacar Breaks Paul Seixas To Win Liège-Bastogne-Liège 2026
· Yahoo Sports
Tadej Pogacar delivered another crushing display in Liège-Bastogne-Liège 2026, riding clear with 14 kilometers to go to seal his third straight victory and fourth overall in the Ardennes Monument after 259.5 kilometers of racing.
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2026 Liege-Bastogne-Liege
But this was not a simple solo from distance. For a while, it was a fight.
The race came alive on the Côte de la Redoute, around 35 kilometers from the finish, where Pogacar launched the move everyone expected. Only one rider could follow. Nineteen year old Frenchman Paul Seixas matched him, setting up a surprising and gripping duel at the front.
Behind them, the damage was immediate. Remco Evenepoel and the rest of the favorites were distanced on the climb and never made it back. The race for victory was already up the road.
Pogacar and Seixas pushed on together, trading turns and testing each other across the Ardennes terrain. The young Frenchman refused to crack, holding the wheel of the world champion and forcing Pogacar to dig deeper than usual.
The decisive blow came on the Côte de la Roche-aux-Faucons.
With 14 kilometers remaining, Pogacar lifted the pace again. This time, Seixas could not respond. The elastic snapped, and Pogacar rode away, quickly opening a gap that only grew as he powered toward Liège.
From there, it was all control.
Pogacar crossed the line alone, arms raised, adding another Monument to his growing collection. Seixas followed in second after a breakthrough performance that put him firmly among the sport’s rising stars.
Evenepoel and the other contenders finished well behind, unable to respond when the race exploded on La Redoute.
Pogacar once again proved that when he goes, the race is over.
Tadej Pogacar Under Pressure
"It means a lot to win again one of the biggest races of the year," Pogacar told Belgian television at the finish line.
In what was only his fifth race this year, Pogacar claimed a fourth victory, and three of those in Monuments, while his only blip was a second place behind Wout van Aert at Paris-Roubaix two weeks ago.
"I don't have a lot of opportunities to win because I don't race a lot," added Pogacar.
"So it's a lot of pressure for me to deliver on days like today.
"I'm really, really happy that we succeeded. I couldn't be more proud of the team."
But in 19-year-old Seixas, he now has a rival seemingly capable of pushing him to the limit.
"On the Redoute climb, I was really going deep," said Pogacar.
"But on the top, he came next to me and I was like, okay, really impressed."
At that point, he expected Seixas to stay with him to the finish.
"Maybe back in my head, I was already preparing to do a duel sprint because he was so strong.
"But I tried on the Roche-aux-Faucons climb, I tried to keep my pace... It suits me super well and luckily he dropped."
It was Seixas's first attempt at Liège-Bastogne-Liège and only his second ever Monument race, having finished a distant seventh behind Pogacar at last October's Il Lombardia.
But having won La Flèche Wallonne on Wednesday, Seixas continues to prove with every outing that he is Pogacar's heir apparent.
Paul Seixas Holds Tadej Pogacar Before Roche-Aux-Faucons Crack
It was a lightning-fast race from start to finish with hostilities launched straight after the checkered flag was dropped.
An early crash split the peloton in two, with Evenepoel in the front bunch and the other contenders behind.
They opened up a maximum lead of four minutes and the breakaway lasted 160km before Pogacar's UAE Team Emirates outfit finally reeled them in.
That set up the inevitable charge into the Côte de la Redoute, where the winning move had been made in each of the previous four years: twice by Evenepoel in 2022 and 2023, and then twice by Pogacar.
As expected, Pogacar made his devastating bid for victory there, some 35km from the finish.
And while he instantly distanced everyone else, there was one man who stuck to his wheel, fighting grimly to hold on all the way to the top, even over the steepest sections of the brutal climb.
They had an advantage of more than 30 seconds over a chase group by the top and that grew steadily to 1 minute 30 seconds over the next 20km to the shorter but steeper Côte de la Roche-aux-Faucons.
This time, though, Seixas could not hold on and 600 meters from the top of that, with 14km left, Pogacar finally cracked the young Frenchman's resistance.
Seixas crested the climb 20 seconds behind Pogacar, and the race was run.