The official Great Bauke Mollema thread

[theyoungest]

Typical Dutch thing. What about the camper/Chevy guy, Tendam?

El Tee Dee, as Mart Smeets likes to call him. He is also 'zo lekker normaal gebleven'.

 

[Kokoso]

nice to find a picture of the ONLY time he took the lead yesterday. he rode like a f'n coward too.

Agree here.

 

[Kokoso]

of course. mollema I can eaisly see blow tomorrow. ventoux does strange things with riders. mollema for instance isn't a real high mountain climber. the hysterical euphoria uin the netherlands is ridiculous. many people here are sayign mollema can win the tour and are insulted outside netherlands nobody talks or cares about the blkin guys. rofl. well I can assure you the final weke will be between contador, quintana dn frooem and they will also be on the podium, under normal circumstances, while boogerd yesterday on tv said mollema is already certain of 2nd place. lol. and all of that after one semi mountainstage we've had in which he dropped on the hardest longest climb with 25 riders still left.

But he didn't drop when there was 25 riders left in group. They were much less actually.

 

[classicomano]

And he wasnt in trouble at all.

 

[Winnen]

Before the TdF started I thought TGBM would be between 10 and 5 at the end of the tour. Now I think he could be top 5. Froome/Contador/Quintana/Kreuziger are likely to be the first 4 IMHO.

 

[theyoungest]

One thing's for sure: Mollema doesn't have any parcours knowledge. He's never ridden the Ventoux in his life.

 

[Kwibus]

Before the TdF started I thought TGBM would be between 10 and 5 at the end of the tour. Now I think he could be top 5. Froome/Contador/Quintana/Kreuziger are likely to be the first 4 IMHO.

I expect Kreuziger to have a bad day sooner or later as well. He tends to have them in a GT.
If not then that would be a first for him.

 

[Pippo_San]

If TGBM is gonna fail spectacularly sooner or later, Kreuziger is gonna fail in an epic fashion "à-la-Porte".

 

[IndianCyclist]

Before the TdF started I thought TGBM would be between 10 and 5 at the end of the tour. Now I think he could be top 5. Froome/Contador/Quintana/Kreuziger are likely to be the first 4 IMHO.

3rd or 4th. I don't think he is under any illusion as to what his capacity is. He will stick with the front group as long as possible and then go at his own pace. Kreuziger is going to drop out. Quintana has a big task to climb unto 3rd place.

 

[Ryo Hazuki]

Nope. Unless you're a selective reader.

What I certainly can't stand is the Dutch hype around the guy, the 'nuchtere Groninger'. Blegh. A few years ago we had a 'nuchtere Achterhoeker', and look how they love him now

or a nuchtere zeeuw called hoogerland, who in fact turned out to be a unstabile/labiele idiot because of the barbed wire3 icnsident. if it's oen word I dson't ever want to hear being said about someone it's "nuchtere" you think quintana is biting his nails for today? of course not

 

[Ryo Hazuki]

And he wasnt in trouble at all.

yes he wa,s he was in final wheels truggling, he admitted it himself after the stage. you will see today

 

[classicomano]

yes he wa,s he was in final wheels truggling, he admitted it himself after the stage. you will see today

What he admitted after the stage is that he wasnt in trouble but couldnt be bothered wasting energy moving up as he was gonna go over the top with the main group anyway.

And yes he could crack today as these things arent his speciality, but really stop making up stuff.

 

[Kokoso]

What he admitted after the stage is that he wasnt in trouble but couldnt be bothered wasting energy moving up as he was gonna go over the top with the main group anyway.

And yes he could crack today as these things arent his speciality, but really stop making up stuff.

Let's wait and see...maybe he'll surprise us all.

 

[Dekker_Tifosi]

 

[Kokoso]

Yesterday rather not so great Bauke Mollema... But great Laurens Ten Dam.

 

[Dekker_Tifosi]

Yesterday rather not so great Bauke Mollema... But great Laurens Ten Dam.

Mollema has never been really good on ultra long climbs. That's why he did so well in Vuelta 2011... not so many 10km+ climbs there. Except maybe Sierra Nevada but that's not steep enough.

 

[theyoungest]

I think Ten Dam will prove the better of the two Belkin guys in the final week. I don't think either of them will get on the podium, but maybe Ten Dam could be 4th.

 

[del1962]

I think Ten Dam will prove the better of the two Belkin guys in the final week. I don't think either of them will get on the podium, but maybe Ten Dam could be 4th.

He looked stronger than Mollema on Ventoux

 

[Kokoso]

Mollema has never been really good on ultra long climbs. That's why he did so well in Vuelta 2011... not so many 10km+ climbs there. Except maybe Sierra Nevada but that's not steep enough.

I'm reading it again about lot of riders and again it makes me wonder, what that means "has never been realy good on ultra long climbs". This seems to me as dubious concept. And even if there was such thing, which I doubt very much, there is alwas possibity that one can improve is skills.

But I don't think there's some difference between climb like Ax-3 Domains and Mt. Ventoux. It's about endurance. It's not "strength" climb where explosive riders jak Sagan, Gilbert or whoever can do anything.

For example Mollema didn't do well neither on Ax3 Domains nor Mt. Ventoux. So can we say he's not good at shorter climbs also? I don't think so. That's just his level. Albulapass is certanily very long climb and he was amongst best three, probably the best. The same goes for Kreuiziger. Repeatedly he did very well on long climbs yet some put him into category "has never been really good on long climbs". You can add Purito to this a I'm sure there are more. That's just same nonsense like "pure climber" and "not pure climber" categories in my opinion. It's not about if you are this or that, but about how you climb in fact.

So who are the ones really good on long climbs? Froome and Quintana? And is this some native ability?

 

[classicomano]

I think were gonna see some epic Mollema pain faces in the next couple of stages.

 

[Pulpstar]

Lets face it - the decision not to really help Saxo-Tinkoff with the pulling in the Echelon stage was a daft one.
Can't see why they wouldn't want to gain an advantage over Movistar and whoever else.

 

[Pippo_San]

 

[theyoungest]

Top-10 for either Mollema, Ten Dam, or both of them, would be a fantastic result. Of course the Dutchies already took to the streets in jubilation, but realistically you could already see that they're not among the 4 or 5 strongest climbers in this Tour.

 

[Ryo Hazuki]

I wonder how boogerd who made himself a total idiot in recent 2 weeks by saying amongst other things that mollema's 2nd place was already certain, is going to talk himself out of this one tonight

 

[Galic Ho]

Post pictures then. He was in a lot of pain today.