"Flirt with the limit where your legs explode" - Paul Seixas takes on crucial Tour de France test as he races his first professional TTT

Paul Seixas is a rider with plenty talents on the bike, however some aspects of pro cycling can only be learnt with experience and time. At 19, he has never ridden a team time trial as an elite rider. Today's at the Tour Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes will be his first, and will be a crucial test ahead of the Tour de France.

The TTT is an effort that is highly specific. Coordination between the riders, proximity between each other, length and effort in the stints through the front of the group... There are many variables that are not at play in neither a traditional road race or individual time trial. And Seixas is yet to learn them in a World Tour peloton.

"That's why we're quite curious about what this will bring. It's something you can only learn in a race," Luke Rowe argued in an interview with Het Nieuwsblad. "You can practice, train and recon as much as you want, even on closed circuits, it's never comparable to a race itself. Just because of the speed. In modern cycling, from the start you have to flirt with the limit where your legs explode. You have to constantly feel that something could go wrong at any moment".

Furthermore today's 23-kilometer long route features two small climbs in its first half, making the effort quite harder, and the effort gauging to also be more complicated to manage. At the Tour de France the same will happen, with race organizers steering clear of the traditional flat courses. "You can't imitate that in training. There you might get the feeling that the team time trial is going well. If you have that feeling in a race, it simply means it's not going fast enough".

"It mustn't go smoothly. Plus, if you make a mistake during the recon or in training, there are no consequences. If you make a mistake during the race, you pay for it cash by definition. Either you crash, or you lose a lot of time. That feeling, that awareness, is what Paul needs to master".

The French team do not hide that they have a day in which gathering experience and coordination is key, and that victory may not be on the cards. After the withdrawal of Matthew Riccitello on the first stage, the team is down one rider. Seixas will nevertheless have the support of great time trialists such as Stefan Bissegger and Daan Hoole to put the team in a strong position.

With Seixas also evolving greatly in the discipline, there is a good chance he will even be able to put time into some of his rivals. “Physically, it’s not an issue at all. And tactically, we worked a lot on this discipline this winter, including on closed circuits. It’s something we’ll do more of before the Tour as well.”

Rowe will be eager to see the results, as at the Tour, a strong performance in Barcelona could also put the team in the yellow jersey. “You don’t get many chances at a team time trial. This will be a perfect dress rehearsal.”