{"id":1878414,"date":"2026-04-11T10:29:00","date_gmt":"2026-04-11T07:29:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/?p=1878414"},"modified":"2026-04-11T10:29:00","modified_gmt":"2026-04-11T07:29:00","slug":"winning-mentality-pays-off-in-spades-for-aj-august-seixas-seals-overall","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/?p=1878414","title":{"rendered":"‘Winning Mentality’ Pays Off in Spades for AJ August, Seixas Seals Overall"},"content":{"rendered":"
US rider Andrew AJ August landed the most important victory of his career on Saturday, soloing to a classy victory in the Itzulia Basque Country race in Eibar.<\/p>\n
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The 20 year old from Rochester kicked clear of a strong breakaway with just over 12km remaining, being joined by Ra\u00fal Garc\u00eda (Movistar Team) but then dropping the Spaniard with slightly over 10km left.<\/p>\n
August crested the top of the final climb alone and dropped down a road-soaked descent to take the victory. Garc\u00eda was 16 seconds behind, with Frank Van Den Broek (Team Picnic PostNL) and Gal Glivar (Alpecin-Premier Tech) a further 18 seconds behind.<\/p>\n
\u201cI was surprised,\u201d August admitted. \u201cAfter the time trial I was having a bit of a tough week so I didn\u2019t expect to win today. But in my head I always keep the winning mentality and I was able to deliver a win today, which was incredible.\u201d<\/p>\n
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Overnight leader Paul Seixas had a stressful day, finishing 4\u201915 behind August and losing a chunk of time to Tobias Halland Johannessen (Uno-X Mobility). He spent much of the finale chasing the day\u2019s break and trying to limit Johannessen\u2019s gains, although he ultimately salvaged the situation.<\/p>\n
He ended the race 2\u201930 ahead of Florian Lipowitz (Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe) and a further three seconds in front of Johannessen.<\/p>\n
Incredibly, it marks only the first WorldTour stage race victory for a French rider in 19 years, with Christophe Moreau\u2019s 2007 Crit\u00e9rium du Dauphin\u00e9 success the last such triumph.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s definitely incredible, especially considering how today went,\u201d Seixas said of his week. \u201cI felt great again. My team did an amazing job positioning me right up until I decided to attack and the real battle started. It was a very tough day for everyone. I\u2019m happy to have won this stage again. And to be able to win the overall and three stages, it\u2019s just fantastic.\u201d<\/p>\n
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Conquering the cold<\/h2>\nPaul Seixas tops the Itzulia Basque Country podium ahead of Florian Lipowitz and Tobias Halland Johannessen (Photo: Tim de Waele\/Getty Images)<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
As for August, Saturday also marked a breakthrough. His only other pro win was in the Volta Comunitat Valenciana in early February, but this success is far more important.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe just stayed calm and kept believing,\u201d he said, speaking of his time in the break.<\/p>\n
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What about the freezing weather? Did that suit him better than the heat earlier this week?<\/p>\n
\u201cI mean, I didn\u2019t feel good, but maybe I felt better than others,\u201d he smiled.<\/p>\n
It confirms his promise and rewards the Ineos Grenadiers team, with whom he made his pro debut at 18 years of age just over two years ago.<\/p>\n
Seixas, too, is repaying his squad for their own show of faith. The under 19 feeder team to Decathlon CMA CGM signed him when he was just 16, with the WorldTour debut coming last year at 18.<\/p>\n
He won three stages this week but came under pressure on the final stage when a large move went clear containing Johannessen. This caught early leaders Ben Healy (EF Education-EasyPost), Mattias Skjelmose (Lidl-Trek) and Marc Soler (UAE Team Emirates-XRG) and, with four of Johannessen\u2019s teammates present and driving the pace, Seixas leaped clear to try to bridge.<\/p>\n
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However he was trapped in no man\u2019s land and was over three minutes back when August jumped away from Johannessen and others.<\/p>\n
Seixas stayed close enough to seal the overall win, and learned more about tactics as a result of the stage.<\/p>\n
He also learned something else too.<\/p>\n
\u201cI know I can compete with the best in the world. Of course, there were a few riders that weren\u2019t here, that fell, that weren\u2019t going well. So I shouldn\u2019t go so far as to say I\u2019m the best or in the top three, but in any case, I know I can race a bit.<\/p>\n
\u201cI know I can play with them and race at the front with ambitions. That\u2019s what\u2019s good.\u201d<\/p>\n
[analyse_image type=”featured” src=”https:\/\/velo-cdn.outsideonline.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/GettyImages-2270872367.jpg”] Shane Stokes Updated April 11, 2026 12:29PM US rider Andrew AJ August landed the most important victory of his career on Saturday, soloing to a classy victory in the Itzulia Basque Country race in Eibar. The 20 year old from Rochester kicked clear of a strong breakaway with just over 12km remaining, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[226,71],"class_list":["post-1878414","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-politics","tag-crawlmanager","tag-velo-outsideonline-com"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1878414","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1878414"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1878414\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1878414"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1878414"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1878414"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
![\"Paul](\"https:\/\/velo-cdn.outsideonline.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/GettyImages-2270873220.jpg?width=3840&auto=webp&quality=75&fit=cover\")