"The way we're seeing guys actually starting to beat Pogacar..." - Can Evenepoel and Seixas challenge World Champion in Liège? Armstrong, Hincapie, Bruyneel and Martin weight in

Liège-Bastogne-Liège, the fourth monument of the season and final spring classic, is fast approaching. Tadej Pogacar is headlining the race as the man to beat but he is facing Amstel Gold Race winner Remco Evenepoel and, this Wednesday's main favourite for Flèche Wallonne, Paul Seixas. Lance Armstrong, George Hincapie, Johan Bruyneel and Spencer Martin have talked about the Ardennes tryptic and the three main eventers.

The first of the World Tour classics saw Evenepoel take the win, after a race that went smoothly from him, where he didn't have to put in even one attack. "It goes so fast. If you look at the average, 43Km/h, that is incredibly fast. And there are 3,400 metres of climbing in there," Bruyneel said in The Move podcast. That early pace setting from Red Bull - BORA - hansgrohe did the expected effect, suffocating the peloton before the first serious attack. "Because by the time they get there, they're all already dead. There were only ten riders who could still go. We saw one acceleration, and that was it."

Evenepoel followed Romain Grégoire and right after, the favourites' group was thinned down to just three men as Kévin Vauquelin crashed and took down several other riders alongside him. "It would have been a different race. I think it was a real target for [Matteo] Jorgenson. He arrived in good form and had just come down from an altitude camp on Teide. And Vauquelin is a rider who suits the Amstel well. It would have been different — but I don't think there would have been a different winner. I don't think so."

However it is a crash that brings big changes to the Ardennes, as Jorgenson was set up to be Visma's leader and with specific preparation towards the three races - whilst Vauquelin himself may not recover from his injuries to regain his very best form.

It was a race where Evenepoel looked by far the strongest, and was followed by defending champion Mattias Skjelmose who was beaten in the sprint for victory. Behind, no-one was anywhere near the same level (except for a Romain Grégoire, who cracked in the final half hour of the race.

The Belgian pundit praised Benoìt Cosnefroy, who led UAE onto a podium. "He did all the work. There was an EF rider [Alex Baudin] who took the odd turn at the front, but Cosnefroy really did everything — and ended up winning the sprint for third place, two minutes behind. That shows the gap between the top two and everyone else. But still it was a good race from him."

Flèche Wallonne follows this Wednesday, and afterwards comes Liège-Bastogne-Liège where the three will meet for the first time this season. Last year, they were together on the podium of the European Championships' road race, where Seixas broke through as a top climber.

"It's being built as this three-man battle with Remco, Pogacar and now Paul Seixas. This kid overnight, not overnight, in a year - and you guys apparently have all the numbers to confirm this is the real deal - He is in the conversation," Lance Amstrong argued. George Hincapie agrees, lifting the Frenchman to a level that can only be compared with one other rider in the peloton: "What he did in the Basque Country is incredible, Pogacar-esque". There, the 19-year old won three out of the six stages with tough competition, but looked by far the strongest, ruling over the overall classification with ease all week long.

These two men are the only ones who can realistically challenge Pogacar in Liège, but even if it is possible, how do you beat him? "The way we're seeing guys actually starting to beat Pogacar is like 'maybe we don't need to go toe-to-toe pulling with him on breakaways'," Hincapie argued. "Maybe they kind of sandbag and not pull as much and just think about getting to the finish line faster".

Wout Van Aert has done so slightly in Roubaix, to some effect. Above all, doing otherwise has proved to be a deadly tactic - as Mathieu van der Poel can tell after Milano-Sanremo and the Tour of Flanders.

"Remco is having a really good build up to this week and I'm sure this week is super important for him as we just saw today. And then we have Seixas in the mix, hopefully it's quite interesting. Hopefully Pogacar doesn't ride away from them and we have a really exciting finish like we've had in the last few world cups (world championships, ed.).