Dumoulin.

[DFA123]

Re: Re:

Perhaps his progress is clear to you, just as Froome's was to Sky fans circa 2012-13. If you take of the rose-tinted glasses then his transformation is every bit as ludicrous.

"Every bit as ludicrous" is absolutely false.

Nonsense. It's a subjective statement - I find it every bit as ludicrous - you may not, but the statement can't be absolutely false. It's a bit arrogant to even suggest as much.

 

[Saint Unix]

Froome started off as a much worse rider than Dumoulin was and became way better than Dumoulin at his best. How is Froome not more ludicrous? Surely the only thing you can judge a transformation by is the difference in ability pre- and post-transformation? Froome's transformations leapfrogs Dumoulin's by a massive margin.

 

[ontheroad]

Nothing should ever surprise you in this sport. Dumoulin is like Froome up until this years tour, he just never seems to have a bad day. Big power TTer who is also in the top 3 climbers in the world.

 

[SeriousSam]

Re: Re:

Perhaps his progress is clear to you, just as Froome's was to Sky fans circa 2012-13. If you take of the rose-tinted glasses then his transformation is every bit as ludicrous.

"Every bit as ludicrous" is absolutely false.

Nonsense. It's a subjective statement - I find it every bit as ludicrous - you may not, but the statement can't be absolutely false. It's a bit arrogant to even suggest as much.

It's not. When we say that Froome's trajectory is ludicrous, that's not a subjective claim about how we feel about it, but an objective claim about the extreme and unparalleled jump from being a middle of the road rider to being a world beater.

 

[ontheroad]

Re:

Froome started off as a much worse rider than Dumoulin was and became way better than Dumoulin at his best. How is Froome not more ludicrous? Surely the only thing you can judge a transformation by is the difference in ability pre- and post-transformation? Froome's transformations leapfrogs Dumoulin's by a massive margin.

Froome's is unprecedented but Dumoulin deserves serious scrutiny also, he is not built to be dropping clmbers and winning races on long mountain passes. He defies gravity.

 

[DFA123]

Re:

Froome started off as a much worse rider than Dumoulin was and became way better than Dumoulin at his best. How is Froome not more ludicrous? Surely the only thing you can judge a transformation by is the difference in ability pre- and post-transformation? Froome's transformations leapfrogs Dumoulin's by a massive margin.

I think there is more scope to believe Froome was a late developer due to his upbringing. His training program and terrible bike handling skills certainly would have held him back in his early career imo, and there was big potential for improvements. And he did improve a lot as an early pro, before his transformation - with his 36th finish in the Giro.

Dumoulin was mollycoddled in top youth teams from a young age - by 20 he already had loads of experience with training and racing with other pro level riders. He had pretty limited room to improve prior to his big transformation. So the big transformation was equally ludicrous in both cases.

The main difference between them right now is simply that Froome is a winner, with a real killer instinct. He will control the race at the right time and take risks when needed in order to win. Dumoulin is a bit, well, soft in that respect.

 

[DFA123]

Re: Re:

Perhaps his progress is clear to you, just as Froome's was to Sky fans circa 2012-13. If you take of the rose-tinted glasses then his transformation is every bit as ludicrous.

"Every bit as ludicrous" is absolutely false.

Nonsense. It's a subjective statement - I find it every bit as ludicrous - you may not, but the statement can't be absolutely false. It's a bit arrogant to even suggest as much.

It's not. When we say that Froome's trajectory is ludicrous, that's not a subjective claim about how we feel about it, but an objective claim about the extreme and unparalleled jump from being a middle of the road rider to being a world beater.

Of course that is a subjective claim. There are infinite factors that can be used to define whether or not such an extreme jump is ludicrous or not. It's up to you how much importance you place on each one.

For me, Dumoulin's progression to GC superstar is every bit as ludicrous as Froome's.

 

[Saint Unix]

Re: Re:

Froome's is unprecedented but Dumoulin deserves serious scrutiny also, he is not built to be dropping clmbers and winning races on long mountain passes. He defies gravity.

Not disagreeing at all. I'm arguing the statement from DFA that Dumoulin is "every bit as ludicrous as Froome". Dumoulin is still an obvious doper, even if he can't hold a candle to the most obvious doper ever.

 

[DFA123]

Re: Re:

Froome's is unprecedented but Dumoulin deserves serious scrutiny also, he is not built to be dropping clmbers and winning races on long mountain passes. He defies gravity.

Not disagreeing at all. I'm arguing the statement from DFA that Dumoulin is "every bit as ludicrous as Froome". Dumoulin is still an obvious doper, even if he can't hold a candle to the most obvious doper ever.

I just think that comparing the development of a guy coming from Froome's background, with that of a rider like Dumoulin, who has been in the 'system' from a young age is not so straight forward as just looking at results / and age-by-age performance.

A sudden transformation from a guy who has been in the system for years and years, is just as ludicrous as a relative outsider suddenly making a slightly bigger jump. Same reason for me that if Roglic suddenly become a GC superstar, it wouldn't necessarily be as ludicrous as if someone like Davide Martinelli, who has been in the system for ages suddenly made a similar leap.

 

[Saint Unix]

Re: Re:

I think there is more scope to believe Froome was a late developer due to his upbringing. His training program and terrible bike handling skills certainly would have held him back in his early career imo, and there was big potential for improvements. And he did improve a lot as an early pro, before his transformation - with his 36th finish in the Giro.

36th at the Giro is nothing impressive. You can look at riders who have done better than that in recent years and find some proper nobodies.

Being a late developer also doesn't explain how he went from a downward trajectory that looked like it would result in him getting dropped by the team to suddenly being the best rider* in an entire Vuelta that featured superdopers like Cobo, Wiggins and Menchov.

*He would have won the race easily if he hadn't been tied down by his team.

 

[Brullnux]

Except Martinelli is a sprinter, and it's been a long time we've been saying roglic could become a great gt rider? I don't understand these examples? Dumoulin even before than Vuelta had shown very decent performances at the Tour De Suisse. His progression is a lot less suspicious than the fact he's taken on the Giro/Tour double with so far better results than froome

 

[DFA123]

Re: Re:

I think there is more scope to believe Froome was a late developer due to his upbringing. His training program and terrible bike handling skills certainly would have held him back in his early career imo, and there was big potential for improvements. And he did improve a lot as an early pro, before his transformation - with his 36th finish in the Giro.

36th at the Giro is nothing impressive. You can look at riders who have done better than that in recent years and find some proper nobodies.

Being a late developer also doesn't explain how he went from a downward trajectory that looked like it would result in him getting dropped by the team to suddenly being the best rider* in an entire Vuelta that featured superdopers like Cobo, Wiggins and Menchov.

*He would have won the race easily if he hadn't been tied down by his team.

Sure, I really don't want to defend Froome here. His transformation is ridiculous, and probably unprecedented in the speed and scope of the improvement he made. But I still think it's fair to say that he was pretty raw for a pro rider, with significant potential to grow legitimately - which was taking place simultaneously in the 2011-2012 period as he suddenly found himself at the front of the race.

Dumoulin wasn't. He was already a polished professional; a somewhat limited, but very experienced 25 year old pro. And then he still made a massive overnight leap to top tier GC rider - and has kept improving since. For me, the transformation is different but it's just as ludicrous and suspicious.

 

[DFA123]

Re:

Except Martinelli is a sprinter, and it's been a long time we've been saying roglic could become a great gt rider? I don't understand these examples? Dumoulin even before than Vuelta had shown very decent performances at the Tour De Suisse. His progression is a lot less suspicious than the fact he's taken on the Giro/Tour double with so far better results than froome

That's not really the point. Dumoulin's leap may have been smaller than Froome's , but his career trajectory gave him way more opportunities than Froome to showcase his potential at a younger age. And he very rarely did so. That's what makes his transformation just as ludicrous - he was a known quantity, and was known to not be GC material. Froome still had a bit of the unknown about his potential and prospects.

As you say, the fact that he is still improving and is now quite possibly equal to or even a level above Froome, makes it all the more ludicrous.

 

[hrotha]

Froome has been riding in Europe for fully professional top-level teams since he was 22. This notion that he existed in some kind of wilderness where his talent couldn't develop is baseless.

 

[DFA123]

Re:

Froome has been riding in Europe for fully professional top-level teams since he was 22. This notion that he existed in some kind of wilderness where his talent couldn't develop is baseless.

Nice straw man. The point is that he entered the system much later than other riders - such as Dumoulin and had much less experience of high level races before his big transformation. So of course he was less polished as a rider. And he was a less known quantity.

You would expect some kind of performance leap from a rider entering that kind of environment once he got experience and was able to ride for himself at times. Dumoulin was already doing all that from age 20. Ludicrous.

 

[Saint Unix]

Re: Re:

Nice straw man. The point is that he entered the system much later than other riders - such as Dumoulin and had much less experience of high level races before his big transformation. So of course he was less polished as a rider. And he was a less known quantity.

You would expect some kind of performance leap from a rider entering that kind of environment once he got experience and was able to ride for himself at times. Dumoulin was already doing all that from age 20. Ludicrous.

And yet Froome's best pre-transformation performance came as a fresh-faced pro at Barloworld during the 2008 Tour where he was given freedom to ride his own race. It was pretty much consistently downhill from there, despite more experience riding with other pros and him having access to all of Sky's revolutionary methods and expensive equipment until it suddenly was very uphill. Almost vertically, at that.

 

[DFA123]

Re: Re:

Nice straw man. The point is that he entered the system much later than other riders - such as Dumoulin and had much less experience of high level races before his big transformation. So of course he was less polished as a rider. And he was a less known quantity.

You would expect some kind of performance leap from a rider entering that kind of environment once he got experience and was able to ride for himself at times. Dumoulin was already doing all that from age 20. Ludicrous.

And yet Froome's best pre-transformation performance came as a fresh-faced pro at Barloworld during the 2008 Tour where he was given freedom to ride his own race. It was pretty much consistently downhill from there, despite more experience riding with other pros and him having access to all of Sky's revolutionary methods and expensive equipment until it suddenly was very uphill. Almost vertically, at that.

Well that where bilharzia comes in doesn't it? (not srs ).

Tbh, I'm not really sure what point you're making here; do you think that Froome didn't have much more room to improve technical and tactical aspects than a rider who was in the European system from a far younger age? For me it seems perfectly logical that he would have had to spend time to catch up, regardless of his promising display at the 2008 Tour. The fact his results didn't improve, doesn't necessarily mean he wasn't improving his craft and skills.

Anyway, as mentioned, I think this is a subjective thing which has no absolute answer. For me, Dumoulin is equally ludicrous, because he had all the opportunities and still showed no potential for what he is now. Thousands of riders have followed Dumoulin's career path and very, very few have made anything close to the transformation that he did. Froome is ludicrous in a different way, but he certainly didn't have the same opportunities as Dumoulin to showcase his talent, and has followed a very unique career path. But I don't really have any more to add to the discussion than this, without going round in circles, so I'm out.

 

[Dekker_Tifosi]

For you that's the case, for everyone else, they can see how you are like don quichote refusing to accept every fact thrown at you

 

[Fergoose]

Dumoulin's performances in the much steeper and more mountainous Giro and Vuelta do seem unusual - in part because he doesn't have have a Sky train pulling him uphill. He must expend far more energy in a GT than a Sky or Movistar rider. Just look at his TTT performance at this TDF.

His exploits at the TDF seem less unusual, even with a Giro in his legs. There have been so many sprinters stages to rest during and so few steep MTFs. I'm also not clear which rider behind him on the GC should be ahead of him. Bardet and Quintana have underperfomed. Martin, Porte and Nibali had horrible luck. Froome has the Giro in his legs and Roglic cement late to cycling.

If the speed of the ascents isn't giving undue concern and he isn't beating anyone he shouldnt be then I'll give him the benefit of the doubt for now. Dumoulin is made for the TDF and doubling up with the Giro in a year when Froome doubled up is a horrific tactical error by Sunweb. I don't thinking he'll ever win the TDF unless his team improves.

 

[Robert5091]

Tommy D is the TdF 2018 version of Uran's 2017 TdF. Rode the Sky train, TT'd ok, but never had the legs to get away.

 

[Dekker_Tifosi]

He attacked more than Uran did, including a solo on Rosiere and at least 2/3 digs at every mountain stage. I wonder what else you expected him to do?

 

[Brullnux]

I found it remarkable that he was able to cope with the Giro/Tour combo so well

 

[Roninho]

I find it even more remarkable that nobody in the Dutch media even dares to bring up the subject of doping. So many legitimate reasons to at least mention it:
* The whole Rabobank drama that basically implicated everybody in dutch cycling
* Basically all GT contenders have been implicated with doping in the past 2-3 decades. The last GT guy to do a podium double Giro-Tour was Pantani. And now Dumoulin does a double?
* At the start of sunweb (the shimano/argos years) they focused on sprinters with a line that this was a better way to compete compared to going for a GC. That story has slowly dissapeared

etc.

 

[DFA123]

Re:

I find it even more remarkable that nobody in the Dutch media even dares to bring up the subject of doping. So many legitimate reasons to at least mention it:
* The whole Rabobank drama that basically implicated everybody in dutch cycling
* Basically all GT contenders have been implicated with doping in the past 2-3 decades. The last GT guy to do a podium double Giro-Tour was Pantani. And now Dumoulin does a double?
* At the start of sunweb (the shimano/argos years) they focused on sprinters with a line that this was a better way to compete compared to going for a GC. That story has slowly dissapeared

etc.

I remember doping being mentioned a few times after Dumoulin's 2015 transformation. And he basically said something like ''if I saw someone do that transformation, I would think they were doping as well". Since then, despite him improving several levels, to the point where he should have won the Giro and would have been in strong contention for the Tour, it's all gone very quiet.

My guess is that Dutch sport is in such a nadir at the moment in general, that they are trying to cling to every bit of success they can. Both the fanboys and the media are in a state right now where they are willing to believe in miracles it seems.

 

[Bardamu]

Re: Re:

I find it even more remarkable that nobody in the Dutch media even dares to bring up the subject of doping. So many legitimate reasons to at least mention it:
* The whole Rabobank drama that basically implicated everybody in dutch cycling
* Basically all GT contenders have been implicated with doping in the past 2-3 decades. The last GT guy to do a podium double Giro-Tour was Pantani. And now Dumoulin does a double?
* At the start of sunweb (the shimano/argos years) they focused on sprinters with a line that this was a better way to compete compared to going for a GC. That story has slowly dissapeared

etc.

I remember doping being mentioned a few times after Dumoulin's 2015 transformation. And he basically said something like ''if I saw someone do that transformation, I would think they were doping as well". Since then, despite him improving several levels, to the point where he should have won the Giro and would have been in strong contention for the Tour, it's all gone very quiet.

My guess is that Dutch sport is in such a nadir at the moment in general, that they are trying to cling to every bit of success they can. Both the fanboys and the media are in a state right now where they are willing to believe in miracles it seems.

Dutch sport is doing quite well actually, it's just that in the #1 sport football they have been terribly average for the first time in ages. They're doing well in both the Summer and Winter Olympics and have a F1 star and now a strong cycling generation.

And regarding that it's been quiet surrounding Dumoulin I guess it has to do with his team being actively anti-doping (yes, Sky was that as well before), Dumoulin sharing his data with journalists when they ask for it, and that the few people in their team from the "doping generation" are known to be non-dopers (Ten Dam).

It doesn't mean that he doesn't dope, the public should never become too naïve, but atleast from the outside Dumoulin looks like a very honest and transparent guy.