Pogacar chases fifth Tour de France title as Vingegaard and teen Seixas loom
The 2026 Tour de France begins in Barcelona with Tadej Pogacar seeking a record-equalling fifth victory, while Jonas Vingegaard arrives fresh from a Giro win and 19-year-old Paul Seixas carries French hopes.
Pogacar's pursuit of a fifth crown
Tadej Pogacar, 27, arrives at the 2026 Tour de France with four titles already (2020, 2021, 2024, 2025). A fifth would place him alongside Jacques Anquetil, Eddy Merckx, Bernard Hinault and Miguel Indurain as the only riders to win the race five times. He would be the youngest of that group to reach the milestone. The Slovenian has prepared with a light racing schedule, including a win at the Tour de Suisse two weeks ago, and enters the race as the overwhelming favourite.
- 2020
- 1
- 2021
- 1
- 2024
- 1
- 2025
- 1
Vingegaard and the Giro-Tour double
Jonas Vingegaard, 29, remains the only rider to have beaten Pogacar in the Tour, doing so in 2022 and 2023. This year he carries the added weight of a dominant Giro d'Italia victory into the race, aiming to become the first since Chris Froome in 2018 to win the Giro and Tour in the same season. His Visma Lease a Bike team includes Sepp Kuss, Matteo Jorgenson and Davide Piganzoli, but will be without the injured Wout Van Aert, a key lieutenant.
The French teenager carrying national hope
No French rider has won the Tour since Bernard Hinault in 1985, and none has stood on the podium since Romain Bardet in 2017. Paul Seixas, a 19-year-old from Lyon, is the youngest Tour participant since 1937 and has already won the Tour of the Basque Country and Flèche Wallonne this season. He enters his first three-week race with tempered expectations.
I want to win, but it's my first Tour and we don't know what level I'll be at.
The Barcelona start and a mountainous route
The race begins on 4 July with a team time trial in Barcelona, the first in the Tour since 2019. The course is heavily weighted towards climbers, with few flat stages and a double ascent of Alpe d'Huez scheduled for the penultimate and antepenultimate days. The finish is set for 26 July on the Champs-Élysées in Paris.
- Tour starts with team time trial in Barcelona
- Finish on the Champs-Élysées in Paris
Team line-ups and other contenders
Pogacar's UAE Team Emirates squad features Isaac del Toro as his primary support, along with Adam Yates (recovering from a Giro crash), Brandon McNulty and Felix Großschartner. Marc Soler misses out through injury. Beyond Vingegaard, Remco Evenepoel has shed weight to tackle the high mountains, while Juan Ayuso leads a strengthened Lidl-Trek team and Florian Lipowitz, third in 2025, returns.
