Explanation: Because a trainer has a specialisation in training. Why are scouts being categorized in terms of their specialisation (classic, stage, sprinters) and a trainer only in terms of their method? Why can`t we have trainers who`re good in training climbers while they`re not really good in training people who want to be good at cobbles?
Why: It`s great how trainers have a traditional, modern or ground-breaking method, but when I want to sign them I have no idea whether they`re good in making my sprinter better or that they`re much more suited for a stage racer. They`re now bumping it all together saying they`re 'legendary' good.

Explanation: I`ve always seen recovery as how fast a cyclist can be in form after expending his energy. In a GT you see people who are riding incredibly well for 2 weeks and suddenly have a really bad day where they lose 5 minutes on a climb.
Why: Nowadays this seems to be entirely absent from the game, while I recall it used to be in there. Of course that dates from the time where the daily indicator went from +5 to -5, which really had some nasty impact on your daily form. Riders with high REC should be able to avoid these really nasty bad days (i.e. REC 78 could mean a bad day is at worst a -3 and they don`t happen more often than once in a GT, whereas REC 68 could mean a -5 bad day and at least twice during a GT). Nowadays the only impact REC has in a GT is how much the yellow and red bars are filled, while those bars should empty much faster when you have a bad day and don`t recover that fast anymore. We all know of those team leaders who suddenly aren`t even able to follow their lieutenants uphill anymore.

Explanation: There used to be a time when riders had a particular role in a team. Some people can actually win races, or can end up high in the final rankings of a tour. They should be treated like that as such.
Why: A Grand Leader (Contador, Froome, etc) should be expecting to be the leader during a race. They should be willing to give that role during the race to someone else if they`re not planning to win it (due to them not in good form yet), but if they`re not often enough used as a leader (or not in big enough races) they should get grumpy and start looking for a new team. Wiggins/Froome, Quintana/Valverde, Nibali/Aru/Landa come to mind. But a rider like Poels should be able to get a leader role in, say, the Dauphiné if Froome doesn`t participate there - and could certainly hold you responsible for that expectation.

Explanation: Because there is a lot of stuff happening and the commentator should comment on it.
Why: Because the voice and the spoken lines haven`t been updated since ... PCM04 or so? The only improvement so far seems to be that some well-known rider names now get mentioned. But the whole 'The breakaway has now more than 2 minutes' gets old pretty fast.

Explanation: A manager is supposed to tell his riders what he expects from them. A rider can also voice his own expectations.
Why: An objective is nice, but is it because you expect him to win the race, get a top 10 ranking or because you want him to win a sprint jersey? Your sponsor has expectations, so you should be able to relay something similar to your riders.
Perhaps a discussion with your riders could follow if their expectations differ from yours (i.e. winning the mountain jersey is worth more to me than a top 20 ranking).
Right now there isn`t even an award for having a rider in a breakaway, while the sponsor certainly appreciates being seen even if you don`t manage to win the stage. So you should be able to voice an expectation that at least one of the riders should be in a breakaway.

Explanation: Some riders have a preference or dislike for certain weather conditions. They should be impaired by them too then if they`re riding in conditions they dislike.
Why: If someone dislikes heat, he might be susceptible for heatstroke, headaches. If someone dislikes rain, it might be because he gets sloppy when he gets drenched and might fall easier due to lack of concentration.

Explanation: Simulations too often end in random results.
Why: Even if I have Cavendish without a train, he should be able to finish in the top 10 - not somewhere between 30 and 40. He`s not that bad and even if he`s blocked, he will still find a way to get around and end up in the top 15 instead. And he can still latch himself onto the wheel of Kittel or Sagan as well. It`s not that hard.

Also, if I simulate a mountain stage, why am I seeing my team mates who are supposed to get my team leader as fast as possible at the top, arrive 2 minutes earlier than my leader? They`re supposed to drag my leader to the top, not trying to go for their own ranking. Especially not if they`re the fourth best climber in the team of 8 riders in that same race.

A while ago PCM had some nice little simulation going, where you could 'read' events like: 'Gesink moves to the front' (on a mountain stage, to avoid being left behind due to a gap) or 'Howes attacks to catch up with the breakaway'. I really liked that particular addition and I was sad when that was removed. It really added some spice to the simulation of a stage. Perhaps they could reimplement that and offer the option to 'Simulate' and 'Extended simulation' or something.

Also, I really would like to have the option to tell a rider to attack and catch up with the breakaway, or to attack when all the favorites are eyeing each other, leaving the way to the stage open for someone else who`s not considered a threat. You should be able to give such instructions before the race and then see that happen when simulating.

Explanation: On the loading screen we get to see the ranking of your riders. It doesn`t specify what the time difference is with the yellow yersey.
Why: In a GT or races with multiple stages it usually matters more what the time difference is to win the race. Perhaps the time difference can be added next to the ranking column, so you can see when you`re 2nd place, if it is worth the effort to attack to win the race or that you need to consolidate to keep that ranking. An extra page to show your ranking in comparison to your rivals would be a nice addition. Would be nice if that could be done for all your riders, to show the 2 ranked riders above and below each of your riders.

Explanation: It would be a heckuvalot easier if you could just have a single screen where you can see everything you need for a solid financial plan.
Why: Right now if you want to plan ahead, you need to rely on the transfer screen, your financial screen to see what your budget is and how much money you`re making throughout the year, your technical sponsors and even the individual contract negotiations before you can get a grasp of what your spendings will be and how much money you have left.

It would be nifty if there could be a single screen where you can find:
1. A breakdown of your expenses and winnings (currently: Finances/Balance).
Good overview, but can`t we just get a summary, like: Total expenses Training Camps, Total expenses wages, Total prize money, etc. That would give a much more accessible overview (with a mere 3-4 lines on either side of the screen) than the complete breakdown. Perhaps the complete breakdown can be done in a seperate tab?
- 2. Your current budget vs an indication of what your budget for next year could be
A range would be even better, so you can plan for a safe future or gamble on having to win races in order to stay in the black. It would certainly help in planning ahead this way, rather than imposing limits on contract wages. It would give new PCM players a much easier view on how they`re doing, instead of ending up bankrupt in the second season. Right now the only way of getting a hint of how your budget for next season looks like is by offering someone a contract. Surely that number could be displayed somewhere on a static page? Like I said, a range based on your current results.
And perhaps the boundaries of your sponsor - surely Tinkoff is willing/able to spend much more cash than Roompot is able to dish out. If you want a larger budget, you really need to switch sponsors.
- 3. Overview of how much wages you`re accumulating on the transfer market
We have a nice screen of how our squad will look like next year on the transfer screen, complete with an overview of which riders have signed and which have contract negotiations pending. Excellent. Now, the only thing missing is the value of what your budget will be, because you have no clue how these signings will impact your budget, therefore risking you to go bunkrupt if you don`t do your math properly.
The range mentioned in point 2 displayed here, a total calculated of the (signed) contracts for next season and the offered contract negotiations will give you a much easier idea of how much leverage you have in your negotiations. Perhaps now you can easier decide to break off negotiations or offer more money without being imposed by contract limitations.

Explanation: During a race there are often riders falling. Sometimes they are taken out of the race due to injury, but the others just get up and continue.

Why: Because most of the time a fall has some influence. If a rider has fallen and he has scraped his knee, it will impact on his performance; every little inconvenience is an inconvenience after all. It would be great if during the race there would be a little update on what the fallen riders ended up with (grazed knee, some scrapes, possible bruised rib). A little cut out of your energy bar or something could be possible until there is a diagnosis made.

And despite there not being any tour-doctor, you do have a doctor in your team. It would be great if he could do some diagnosis during the race, give the rider some painkillers or so and after the race he will give a final diagnosis. Doesn`t need to be graphical, but a mention that the rider has visited the tour-doctor and got some meds would be nice.

Explanation: When setting off in a time trial, the heartrate for the pace is immediately correct. This should fluctuate and get into a stable heartrate only after a little while.

Why: If you start with a time trial, your rider`s heartrate take only a second to adjust and then continue to be stable. I believe this isn`t likely. At the start you need to accelerate, which speeds up your heartrate. If you have a particular pace and want to keep that pace, you can steady your heartbeat. So a probable solution is to fluctuate the heartbeats based on the TT stat, the higher the faster it stops fluctuating and gets into a stable, lower one. Perhaps a slightly lower heartrate for good TTers is a nice addition as well.

You also see riders to get up and stand on the bike to get some more speed, or to get out of form due to pains, or because it`s a hill/mountain and they need to push harder. Less proficient TT specialist would do these things more, I believe. I would also believe that this is another of these situations where heartrates should fluctuate; getting up and pedaling standing should have an impact on your timetrial because you have less aerodynamica, although it might have less impact if your rider is a good specialist in TT and he knows how to make good use of that extra force. It would certainly give a TT a little more personality and diversity.

Explanation: You can select 2 leaders during a race. I would really like to be able to select more leaders.

Why: If you ride a GT for instance, you can really use a leader and a backup leader. If Froome falls and breaks his leg, you still have others who can fill in as leader. You really don`t want them to get left behind in the early stages.

Unfortunately on flat stages, you can select only 2 leaders. So you pick your leader and your sprinter and they will be protected by your team. Which is good. But if your backup leader falls, nobody waits for him because he`s no leader and he can easily lose a lot of time because of that.

Ideally, it would be great if you could choose which riders should be protected by the team and that you can divide your other riders with tasks who their responsibility is. Keeping a leader at the front isn`t necessary for a whole team, so if one of your leaders falls, the individual protectors for your sprinter and other leader stay in the front of the pack, whereas the rest drops back and returns the other leader to the pack.

This might be a tricky one, but seeing how you can assign riders to a leader already, it might just be okay to remove the 2 leader limit so you can assign teammates to more than 1 leader.

Explanation: There used to be an option where you could choose where, during the race, riders should do something. I would like to give more detailed instructions to my riders before the race.

Why: If you want to send riders forward to help you once you launch your attack on the jersey, you should have some options for that. There used to be an option in earlier PCMs where you could pick a spot on the map, i.e. km 125 where someone should launch an attack. If you have 2 riders in a breakaway and you want to have someone halfway the mountain to bring you further up to the breakaway if you make the jump, you want to do some tactical planning. Currently there is a very limited number of options available, so it would be nice if you could give instructions, like 'Attack on km 125'. I`ve seen too often that riders attack halfway on the flat when they`re really bad on the flat; they should attack when they have just reached the foot of the mountain, or in a downhill section.

When the race ends in a 2000m downhill to the finish, there is nobody (like a Nibali) who attacks, knowing that they can win the stage because they`re really good in downhilling and that they can actually win time on people like Pinot, who`re not so great in going downwards. If you know that, you really want to give your leader the task to attack right after you reach the last top of the mountain to maximize that weakness in other rivals.

Explanation: If a rider rides the entire cobbled classics, why shouldn`t that rider improve on that section - even if he doesn`t train as a cobble specialist?

Why: I would expect riders who ride the RvV or Paris-Roubaix to at least get used to cobbled sections. Even if they`re not training to improve that part of their capacities, they do get exposure to them and they might get used at riding across them. They won`t improve dramatically, but if you let them ride those races they should be able to get a bonus stat or two for that. Not each year, but perhaps it can count as +1 for every 5 or 8 cobbled races they`ve finished. Or perhaps there is a +1 chance to improve that stat upon gaining a stat update (like how a Climber trained rider gets a +3 probability in MO, now they might get a +1 probability in COB).

Same thing for mountains perhaps. If a non-proficient rider rides enough mountain stages, he might get a +1 probability on MO despite training as Baroudeur (which doesn`t have any decent probability on MO).

Explanation: We use Objectives right now to determine the fitness of a rider. It would be reasonable to hold them to that and to be able to tell a rider during contract negotiations if they didn`t perform well enough on an objective. (This is an addition to the 'Expectations' suggestion I made earlier.)

Why: A rider has expectations during his season. You give them objectives to aim for and they will try and get the best results there. If (for instance) a leader doesn`t perform and doesn`t get a top 20 spot in a race he should be able to win (and he believes he can win it), you can hold it against him when contract negotiations start. You can tell him how he didn`t perform and offer him less money or less years on a new contract.
On the other hand, if a rider does exceptionally well and managed to win races he wasn`t expected to, he can bring those results to the table during a contract negotiation.

Explanation: After the ideas of Expectations and Contract renewals based upon Objectives, it would be logical to have a means to converse directly with your rider.

Why: This way you can have a talk with your rider (or they with you) and actually discuss things, so the contract negotiations will look like an actual discussion where targets, team role, previous results will all become a part of whether a rider/team wants to continue or that they will part ways. It gives the game a much more interesting transfer market where you need to think of what you want with a rider and what the rider`s ambitions are.

Of course, it will also pave the way for riders to inform you that they are unhappy with their trainer (currently done by mail), that they are unhappy for not having been selected for an objective (out of form, recovering due to injury, think of Kittel last Tour de France) and so on. It reduces the number of e-mails you need to go through and it will become a much more realistic way of communicating, making your riders become actual people rather than entities in your team to achieve things.