'Cut Grand Tour rosters to six riders' - Mollema urges rule change to counter UAE dominance

The 39-year-old Dutchman followed the race from home in his final season as a professional after Lidl-Trek left him out of its Tour de France selection. He made the argument in his column for Dagblad van het Noorden.

Lidl-Trek’s 2026 Tour de France selection was built around Juan Ayuso, Mattias Skjelmose, Mads Pedersen and Quinn Simmons, leaving no place for the veteran.

Mollema laid out his argument for smaller teams as a way to break the super-team stranglehold on the race.

“Teams of only six men in the Tour, that is something I would like to see. Who would they leave at home then? Pogačar also needs two men for the flat stages. They would really have to make choices and could never control the race as well. Especially not if they also have to deal with illness or crashes, as was the case today,” wrote Mollema in his column.

Pogačar’s high level took away much of the suspense of the race for Mollema.

“The fight for stage wins was fun, but the overall victory never really held much interest.”

UAE were able to control the 2026 Tour de France with Isaac del Toro, Adam Yates, Tim Wellens, Nils Politt, Florian Vermeersch and Brandon McNulty across three weeks of mountain and transition stages.

That level of control had already drawn criticism during the race, particularly after stage nine. UAE spent much of the day keeping a powerful breakaway within reach, even though none of the riders in front posed a serious threat to Pogačar’s lead.

Movistar sports director José Joaquín Rojas was the most outspoken in his criticism of UAE’s display of dominance. Although Mathieu van der Poel eventually won from the breakaway in Ussel, ahead of Tobias Halland Johannessen and Tom Pidcock, Rojas questioned why UAE had worked so hard to limit the gap.

“What UAE did yesterday made no sense,” he said. “I speak to 85 per cent of the sports directors and they all think the same.”

Rojas warned that such control could make the race less attractive by leaving rival teams with few realistic opportunities to challenge UAE or gain anything from taking risks.

“Many will say that if there is nothing they can do, they would rather stay at home,” he said.

Mollema drew on his experience at the 2026 Tour de Romandie to argue that smaller pelotons would also improve rider safety.

“Moreover, it would also be good for safety in the peloton. I recently rode the Tour de Romandie, where the teams consisted of seven riders and a few WorldTour teams had also withdrawn. We rode with a peloton of only a hundred men. That created a completely different dynamic. I didn’t see a single crash all week. That was truly wonderful racing.”

The debate over team sizes has flared repeatedly across the past decade of Grand Tour racing. Grand Tour teams were reduced from nine riders to eight in 2018, with race organisers arguing that smaller squads would make stages harder to control and reduce crash risk.