Liège-Bastogne-Liège 2026 Race-Day Morning Bulletin: Pogačar 8/11, Seixas 11/4, Evenepoel 7/2 As 175 Riders Sign On At The Quai Des Ardennes
Sunday 08:30 CEST. The 112th edition of Liège-Bastogne-Liège rolls out from the Quai des Ardennes at 09:55 CEST after a 175-rider sign-on across 25 teams. The Sunday morning bookmakers' board has not moved overnight: Tadej Pogačar (UAE Team Emirates-XRG) sits at 8/11, Paul Seixas (Decathlon CMA CGM) at 11/4 after his Wednesday Flèche Wallonne coronation, Remco Evenepoel (Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe) at 7/2, and Tom Pidcock (Q36.5-Pinarello) at 10/1 on the back of his Wednesday stage win in Arco. The four-rider top of the board has been the same since Friday morning — the longest pre-Liège market consensus in the five-year Pogačar era.
The weather window is the simplest in two years. ZAMG and Royal Meteorological Institute of Belgium (RMI) overnight 06:00 runs converged on a dry, 6°C-to-15°C race-day temperature progression, with light south-westerly winds under 1.6 m/s through the Ardennes. The 60% rain probability ZAMG had carried in the Thursday morning forecast has been progressively scrubbed across four overnight runs, and the Saturday-evening 21:00 update locked the day at zero precipitation risk — the first dry Liège forecast since 2023. The expected race finish time is 16:30 CEST after 259.5km of racing across 4,395 metres of climbing on a route featuring 11 categorised climbs.
UAE Team Emirates-XRG's protection plan for Pogačar is the morning's tactical headline. The team's seven-rider lineup, confirmed at Saturday night's Liège-Centre press conference by sports director Matxin Joxean Fernández, contains: Pogačar, Adam Yates, João Almeida, Brandon McNulty, Marc Soler, Pavel Sivakov and Vegard Stake Laengen. The plan, leaked to Sporza on Saturday evening, is built around a Yates-led Côte de la Redoute reduction at 35 kilometres to go, with Pogačar taking over for a solo from the Roche-aux-Faucons at 14 kilometres remaining — the same script that delivered his 2024 and 2025 wins. The departure of his trusted lead-out man Mikkel Bjerg (illness) is the only late change to the plan.
Decathlon CMA CGM's response to the Pogačar protection is built around Seixas's endurance-test debut at La Doyenne. The 19-year-old French phenom — youngest-ever Flèche Wallonne winner four days ago — rolls out with Clément Champoussin, Valentin Paret-Peintre, Aurélien Paret-Peintre, Bastien Tronchon, Geoffrey Bouchard and Felix Gall. The Decathlon staff have been explicit that Seixas's primary objective is "the front group with 10km to go", with the secondary objective being "any podium". Sports director Stephen Roche, interviewed on RTBF's Saturday-evening preview show, framed it bluntly: "We are not going to win Liège today. We are going to learn how to ride Liège today." The 11/4 morning price is the shortest a 19-year-old has ever carried at La Doyenne.
Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe's Liège card is the spring's most measured. Evenepoel — the 2022 and 2023 winner, the 2026 Amstel Gold Race champion — has been kept off the start sheet of every race since the Amstel solo seven days ago, including a withdrawn Flèche Wallonne start that protected his legs for Sunday. The Belgian rolls out alongside Primož Roglič, Daniel Felipe Martínez, Aleksandr Vlasov, Maximilian Schachmann, Jai Hindley and Patrick Konrad — a seven-rider lineup heavier on GC riders than the team's typical Classic squad. The tactical plan, confirmed by sports director Rolf Aldag at the Saturday morning Liège centre press: a Roglič-led tempo through the Cote de la Roche-aux-Faucons followed by a Martinez-paced Evenepoel attack from 12km out.
The second tier of the market reads: Mattias Skjelmose (Lidl-Trek) 12/1 after second at Amstel and fifth at Flèche Wallonne, Romain Grégoire (Groupama-FDJ) 16/1 on his Liège debut as a protected leader, Ben Tulett (Visma-Lease a Bike) 25/1 after his shock Flèche third place, Lenny Martinez (Bahrain-Victorious) 28/1 in his first Liège start, and Tobias Halland Johannessen (Uno-X Mobility) 33/1. The notable absentees: Wout van Aert (Visma — Paris-Roubaix winner is taking a planned 10-day rest block), Mathieu van der Poel (Alpecin-Deceuninck — confirmed his 2026 spring is over after Roubaix third), and Jonas Vingegaard (Visma — at the Mont Ventoux training camp ahead of Romandie). Their absences had been priced in by Friday morning.
The pre-race conversation in the Quai des Ardennes coffee tent has been the question Stephen Roche left hanging on Saturday evening: "Can a 19-year-old who has won one Monument-level race ride 6 hours and 30 minutes against Tadej Pogačar?" The Cycling Lookout race-day position remains as filed in Thursday morning's three-days-out form guide: Pogačar to win, Seixas in the front group at 10 kilometres to go, Evenepoel third. The 11 climbs of the 2026 route — La Redoute at 35 kilometres remaining, La Roche-aux-Faucons at 14 kilometres remaining, the final Côte de Saint-Nicolas at 5.5 kilometres remaining — will produce the answer between 16:00 and 16:30 CEST.