Like Valverde, Cancellara is now 39 years old, only two riders are older: Engoulvent (40) and Peraud, who's 42 years old! With his AVG 74 he's still competitive, he was 6th last year in the Giro del Trentino. But he'll finally retire at the end of the season. The contracts of Valverde and Cancellara are also ending, but they both still offer AVG 77, so they could continue their careers and still produce some results.
With the Ardennes Week ahead, here is a current look at the best puncheurs, solely ordered by their HIL stat.
HIL 85: Mollema (Katusha), Betancur (Quickstep)
HIL 84: Kwiatkowski (Orica), Villella (Lampre)
HIL 83: Quintana (Quickstep), Henao (Katusha), Ulissi (Tinkoff), Simon Yates (Movistar)
HIL 82: Bardet (Cannondale), Moser (BMC), Aru (Astana), Slagter (Katusha), Costa (Lotto), Spilak (Tinkoff), Van Garderen (Netapp)
HIL 81: Herklotz, Majka (Orica), Vichot (Cannondale), Pinot (Ag2r), Gallopin (Caja Rural), Romeu (Sky), Carter (FDJ)
Taking into account other relevant stats Kwiatek is probably best suited for these races. As I mentioned at the start of the season, Team 8 Up has invested heavily in the climbing department, less so in puncheurs, none of our riders appear in this list. We do have 4 specialists with HIL 80 and AVG between 74 and 77: Koch, Mayordomo, Gross and Nikolaev. They are in top form for the Ardennes races and we hope to see some good results despite the tough competition.
The Amstel Gold Race could hardly have ended better for Team 8 Up. Only two riders managed to escape and our De Souza was crazy enough to attack with 120 km to go and bridge the gap of 8 minutes in the vain hope of a solo victory. He caught the escapees but it didn't take the peloton long to do the same.
The attacks started in earnest with 30 km to go, producing a group of 21 riders, including our 4 best men. Then Dan Martin attacked but that only reduced the group to 12 riders with Mayordomo, Koch and Gross still in the running. We still had the energy to set our riders at 84 effort, so they were right at the front at the top of the final climb, just before the sprint started 1.5 km out.
Our men picked riders to follow, Mayordomo was not able to outsprint Betancur, who won Amstel Gold, but he came 2nd and behind Mollema, Gross was 4th and Koch 5th. They came ahead of strong riders: Ulissi, Simon Yates, Kwiatek, Romeu and Dan Martin. As well as the riders who didn't make it into the top group and were 39 secinds behind like Quintana, Rui Costa, Slagter, Henao, Van Avermaet and Villella.
Three 8 Up riders in the top 5, what a great result. And while I thought Kwiatkowski was the best rider for this race, in the end the two riders with HIL 85 were 1st and 3rd.
This variant of the Fleche Wallone, starting in Dinant, features narrow roads, not only on the Mur de Huy but also the Thier de Huy, just ahead of the Wall with similar gradients. Positioning and luck are desperately needed to not be caught behind weaker riders and lose all chances of a good result. From Team 8 Up Skujins, De Vos and Nikolaev were the first victims, they were accompanied by big names like Kwiatkowski and Bardet, those two finished only 33rd and 34th.
Koch, Barwell and De Sousa also missed out on the decisive move, when a group of 9 riders formed. Koch did win the uphill sprint from his group to finish 10th, beating Simon Yates and Villella. At the very front three riders took off as the uphill sprint started. Last year's WT winner Rui Costa beat Ulissi and Betancur. Old Valverde finished a strong 4th, 36 seconds behind the winning trio, he came ahead of Quintana, Mayordomo, Gross and Moser, Mollema was 9th. 8 Up once more managed to place three riders in the top 10, none in the top 5 this time, but another great result for the team.
The Doyenne went to Quintana. It was Betancur who attacked 35 km out and 6 strong riders set off after him: Quintana, Kwiatkowski, Mollema, Yates, Costa and Villella. We wouldn't catch them and had to fight for the next positions.
Betancur's attack did not pay off, after he was caught he lost contact to the other 6 riders, was caught by the next group and only finished 12th. Quintana had saved up energy for the final uphill kilometer and beat the others by 38 seconds. From our group of 12 riders Moser beat Ulissi, Gross fulfilled a sponsor objective by coming 9th, while his team mates ended at the back of this group.
It was Quintana's first victory since the TdF 2018, after taking a year off in 2019. Rui Costa is riding another strong season and is currently leading the WT rankings again with 395 points, ahead of Mollema (324) and Sagan (312).
At Team 8 Up we are very pleased with the Ardennes results, especially Amstel Gold, which worked out beautifully. No shame in the LBL result, the competition was simply too strong, everybody in the top group had HIL 83+, we cannot compete on that level.
The Tour de Romandie started with a prologue won by Howson. The top sprinters skipped this race, Matthews beat Mezgec and Swift on stage 2, Hofland took stage 3 ahead of Haller and Matthews, the bonus seconds allowed the Australian to slip into the leader's jersey for a day.
The peloton let 9 riders get away on the only mountain stage but caught them again with 70 km to go, long before the only intermediate sprint or the foot of the first of the three climbs. I tried to let Brandtzaeg attack alone at this point, but the peloton wouldn't allow anybody to get away.
On the first two climbs our team set the pace in the front for a long time with 60 effort. As feared, the top riders already attacked towards the top of the penultimate climb and created a group of favourites. We upped the effort and relayed hard downhill and caught the others again, forming a group of 20 riders.
From the foot of the final climb, 14 km long, the favourites started attacking again, we played it safe and set everybody on the dot. Just as we reached them again, the next attacks came, Quintana and Rui Costa formed a duo that wouldn't be caught again. 3 km from the top Quintana left Rui Costa behind to take the stage and the race lead. Boswell, Rolland and Van Garderen came next, with three of our riders close behind.
Stage 5 was considered hilly but also featured a steep final ascent. Foure in the white jersey was over 5 minutes behind Quintana, so I let him attack, hoping to win a stage. He held on for a long time but was swallowed towards the end, he finished 22nd. Again, it was Quintana who proved to be the strongest and once more he won ahead of Rui Costa, Van Garderen was 3rd. Bernar unfortunately lost some time even against his team mates, but he's still 7th overall, Olesen 9th.
A flat ITT of 19.9 km ends the Tour de Romandie. Nothing changed on the podium: Quintana, fresh from his LBL victory, also wins the Romandie, Rui Costa is 2nd, Van Garderen 3rd. Bernar had a mediocre time trial and drops down to 9th overall, Olesen is pushed out of the top 10 by 1 second, Reichenbach is another 5 seconds behind in 12th place.
This year's Giro d'Italia starts with a team time trial in Palermo and ends with a tough hilly in Brescia. There are also two flat ITTs, one short, one long, on stages 9 and 16, as well as a MTT up the Monte Cimone on stage 13. Additionally we have to tackle 7 mountain stages and 4 hilly stages. Of note is also stage 7, a variant of the Roma Maxima with lots of cobbled roads in the second half. Only 4 stages are available for the sprinters.
The favourites are:
- Aru (MON 84), captain of the strong Astana team, supported by Kelderman (82), Porte (79), Ion Izagirre (79) and Nibali (79).
- Ag2r's Pinot (84), who will be helped by Elissonde (80) and Kreuziger (78).
- Cannondale's Boswell (84) is just as strong, but lacks the support the others have.
- Orica brings three good riders, though no clear captain: Herklotz (81), Majka (81) and Landa (80).
- And then there is our team, spearheaded by Bernar (81), with Olesen (81), Reichenbach (80) and Hansen (79) in support.
Our sponsor is hoping for a top 5 result, something we managed last year, but the competition is tough. Expect some drama, both at the front of the GC and concerning our hopes of finishing in the top 5.
The opening TTT of the Giro d'Italia went to Movistar, Fuglsang is the first rider to wear the pink jersey this year. FDJ was just 1 second behind, Astana 6 seconds, 8 Up 15 seconds. Boswell only lost 28 seconds, Orica was 1:30 behind, Pinot's Ag2r 1:51.
The first mass sprint was won by Yannick Martinez, who won the Tour of Qatar this season and took two Giro stages in 2018. He was able to beat Rick Zabel and Elia Viviani.
Stage 3 was already a murderous mountain stage, 223.5 km long with 5 categorised climbs, thankfully with a downhill finish. Because when the speed increased towards the summit of the last climb, our riders were stuck behind the old Astana train, while everybody merrily passed us on the free left hand side. But with an attack at the summit, dragging roughly 20 riders behind us, we caught the favourites again and would finish in a group of 28 riders. Aru won ahead of team mate Porte and Boswell and slipped into the leader's jersey. Would he be able to keep it until the end?
Next up was a hilly stage to Grassano with a short but steep final climb. Pinot came out top, distancing Kelderman, Aru and Boswell by 11 seconds. Our four best men were exactly 1 minute behind.
Stage 5 was flat, Viviani won ahead of Colbrelli and Swift. The following stage was classified as hilly but featured a long flat run to the finish line. After a flurry of late attacks Moser is victorious, but is given the same time as the peloton.
The cobblestoned stage 7 proved to be as difficult as we feared. We couldn't keep our men together, the whole peloton split into small groups and significant time gaps seemed inevitable. Aru seemed unable to hold onto his lead after a puncture.
Debusschere beat Boasson Hagen to win the stage, Bernar and Reichenbach were only a minute behind, while Aru was only 66th and lost about 4 minutes – or so we thought. Impossibly, the organisers decided to award the first 95 riders the same time. Of course, 96th was Olesen and he was 6:25 behind! Porte and Kreuziger finished with Olesen, Katusha's captain Chaves even lost 12:48.
As if that stage wasn't tiring enough, it was followed by the massive climb up to Blockhaus. Pinot came out top again, he won by 30 seconds, Aru showed a small weakness, he was only 4th but lost no time to Boswell and Majka. Bernar was 6th, 1:12 behind, Reichenbach 8th, 2:06 back, Olesen lost 2:31.
Our riders had to tackle the short, flat ITT a day later with average freshness. Foure was our best performer as 9th, 15 seconds behind winner Durbridge. But Bernar also rode a good ITT, just 24 seconds behind, he moves up to 5th place in the GC. Aru ist still in the lead, but now only 7 seconds ahead of Boswell, 37 ahead of Kelderman, Pinot is another 4 seconds behind, Bernar 1:37. Reichenbach is 17th, 4:15 behind.
Stage 10 was mostly flat but ended with a real stinger, the final 2 km to Montecatini Alto have a gradient over 12%, the last metres 23%. The breakaway managed to survive for the first time in this Giro, Foure was 4th, the stage went to Quickstep's Baugnies. Kelderman arrived with Ulissi, he was 20 seconds faster than his captain and race leader Aru, Reichenbach and Boswell lost a few more seconds, Pinot and our riders were another 30 seconds behind.
The course of the following stage was quite similar, only the hills were a bit bigger. The final ascent to Monte Serra was 9 km long @ 7%. The man in pink won his second stage, 8 seconds ahead of his closest rivals. Bernar, Reichenbach and Olesen lost 1:03, Bernar dropped down to 10th overall.
Finally 8 Up can announce a stage winner at this Giro: Nicky Wardle takes stage 12. It was a trident of climbs followed by a long downhill run into Fanano. Wardle is a decent climber (MON 76) and fairly good downhill (74) and his latter abilities secured him the win. At the summit of the final climb Intxausti and Machado were still with him, but neither is as good a descender as Wardle, who attacked and won by over a minute.
Astana had been chasing breaks hard so far, but this time they took it easy, even the late attacks were fairly tame and a group of 34 riders finished exactly 17 minutes behind Wardle, nobody in the top 20 lost any time.
The MTT on stage 13 didn't help 8 Up's cause. Boswell won 8 seconds ahead of Aru, his team mate Dombrowski (whom I failed to mention in the preview, MON 83) was 3rd. Our best riders was Bernar as 12th, he was faster than Ulissi and gained a position in the GC. He's now 9th, 3:51 behind Aru. Reichenbach is 15th (6:15), Hansen 19th (8:32), Olesen 29th (13:33).
Stage 14 was flat, but nearly a whole Milano – Sanremo, starting in La Spezia instead, 260 km long, finishing with the usual Cipressa and Poggio. Alaphilippe beat Colbrelli and Martinez in the mass sprint.
Olesen became part of a strong breakaway on the mountain stage to Briancon. Astana allowed the group a maximum advantage of 21 minutes, making Herklotz the virtual leader by over 7 minutes. The German won the stage 32 seconds ahead of Olesen, Kreuziger was 3rd.
In the new GC, Herklotz is 8th and Olesen 9th. Bernar and Reichenbach lost more time to the favourites, Bernar is now 11th, 4:44 behind Aru, Reichenbach 17th, 7:16 behind. Hansen crashed on the last downhill section and rode on at medium tempo, losing 15 minutes to Aru, he's now 23:35 behind. Heading into the last rest day it's not looking good for our goal of a top 5 finish.
The final week includes three more tough mountain stages and a very hard hilly stage on the final day, but it kicked off with the long and completely flat individual time trial from Pavia to Milan. We didn't realise that Bernar (TTR 73) is better against the clock than everybody in the top 10. And he had a good day, he was faster than his team mates Christie (74) and Foure (76). He was 9th, 43 seconds behind Durbridge, who won ahead of his compatriot Howson.
Bernar was faster than all the top 10 riders and moved all the way up to 5th in the GC. The biggest upset was the poor performance by the Italian race leader Aru, who was only 116th, lost 6:45 and dropped back to 9th overall. But the pink jersey remains with Astana, Kelderman leads Boswell by just 6 seconds, Pinot is now 3rd, 2:01 behind, Dombrowski is 4th.
However, Dombrowski would only be 4th for a day, because he had to withdraw on the last flat stage. Cort Nielsen won the stage, he'd been in the early breakaway and together with Mirtic was able to hold off the peloton by 58 seconds. So Bernar, who was only 11th before the rest day, suddenly found himself in 4th before the difficult last stages and strong riders breathing down his neck. Could he hold on to his position?
The other question was: Would Aru now support Kelderman? We got the answer the following day. Stage 18 was flat until the half-way point, then took us across three passes before climbing up the Passo Giau to an elevation fo 2236 metres.
The early breakaway included three strong climbers: Our Hansen (MON 79), Atapuma (79) and Astana's Kabashi (77). The latter did nothing all day, he was supposed to help his leader later on, but the breakaway's advantage grew too large, up to 28 minutes with 50 km to go. Hansen collected 92 points for the blue jersey and managed to win the stage, beating Atapuma and Kabashi by 37 seconds.
Further back Boswell attacked on the penultimate climb, but Aru and Kelderman stayed with him. Oddly enough, Astana helped in the chase and more importantly, Aru didn't support Kelderman, he took off on his own. Boswell and Pinot, who had joined the group, dropped Kelderman (MON 82), with Boswell gaining more than a minute and thus he's the new leader, exactly 60 seconds ahead of Kelderman. Pinot is now 3rd, Aru rode himself back to 4th, 3:46 behind. Bernar is 5th again, he arrived with Herklotz and keeps a slim lead of 15 seconds over the German. Olesen, Hansen and Reichenbach are now 13th, 15th and 16th. Hansen, Olesen and Wardle still have a chance to become King of the Mountains.
Stage 19 was the easiest of the final stages, though not by much and it did feature this year's Cima Coppi, the Passo dello Stelvio, it was even snowing lightly near the top. Wardle attacked, seizing his chance of winning the blue jersey. Nobody joined him, he had to ride the whole stage on his own. He built up an advantage of up to 13 minutes, collected 57 KoM points and won the stage by nearly three minutes.
Even though the stage wasn't that tough, the three riders at the top of the GC attacked each other. Neither Aru nor any other team mate helped Kelderman, Aru was apparently exhausted from the effort on the previous day and lost time to the top 3. Pinot was the strongest, and Kelderman was able to distance Boswell this time. The American's advantage is down to 24 seconds to Kelderman, 1:10 to Pinot. Reichenbach, Olesen and Bernar had the energy left for an attack at the top of the final small climb and created a gap of 28 seconds over Herklotz, Aru and the rest.
Stage 20 is the final mountain stage and very tough with three cat. 1 climbs before a summit finish on Monte Colmo. It was time to send Reichenbach up ahead, He was 16th, over 13 minutes behind, a real chance to improve his GC position. He finished 2nd, he had to leave the stage to Herrada, having worked as hard as he could to keep the time gap as large as possible.
3rd on the stage was Boswell, 7:38 back, right behind him were Aru and Pinot, again, no help for Kelderman, who lost 20 seconds. Bernar was 9:04 behind, holding onto his 5th place and gaining more time on Herklotz. In fact, his closest rival is now his team mate Reichenbach, who is now 6th, only 4 seconds behind Bernar and 1:18 ahead of Herklotz.
We did not look forward to the final stage, which featured a circuit with a difficult, 7km long hill which would have to be crossed 5 times. Foure had the freshness to qualify himself for the breakaway. He would have wanted to conserve all his energy for the finale, but sadly, Matteo Rabottini also joined the group and he was a real threat for Wardle's blue jersey.
So Foure had to fight for all the mountain points and try to make the race so hard that Rabottini would drop out of the group. Though we were not confident it would work (Rabottini has HIL 76 compared to Foure's 74), it actually did. While Foure collected 76 KoM points, Rabottini only got 28 points and fails to push Wardle off the throne by just 3 points! Well done, Gael Foure, a great performance. Sadly, he couldn't crown it with the stage win, he was the best of the breakaway riders, but was overtaken by 5 top 10 riders.
Aru once more ignored Kelderman and battled with Pinot for the stage, Aru won his third stage, but he'd remain 4th overall. Pinot beat Kelderman by 69 seconds and moves past him in the GC. But it wasn't enough to take the Giro from Boswell, who wins by 23 seconds.
Bernar arrived with Herklotz, Reichenback lost some time, but both riders remain in front of the German and end 5th and 6th. Reichenbach thus repeats his performance from last year, Bernar “replaces” Elissonde, who was 5th for us last year (and was 18th this year, having to support Pinot). Astana's Kabashi wins the white jersey by a large margin and Team 8 Up wins the teams classification, 25:23 ahead of Astana.
The long ITT really helped. Generally, PCM at its best, never a quiet moment, lots of difficult decisions, lots of drama, Pinot and Boswell battling against the strong Astana team.
I noticed how few teams appear in the top 15 of the Giro. In case you are wondering what's been happening to all the teams I've compiled a top 20 table comparing the 2020 salary budgets with the 2014 budgets (thanks once more to PCMCE).
2020
2014
Change
Astana Pro Team
1,314,000
645,000
669,000
Quick-Step
1,058,500
1,112,500
-54,000
Tinkoff-Saxo
913,500
643,000
270,500
Orica-GreenEDGE
792,500
502,500
290,000
Ag2r La Mondiale
721,000
634,000
87,000
Team Katusha
639,500
622,500
17,000
Lotto Belisol
628,500
520,000
108,500
Movistar Team
549,500
746,000
-196,500
Cannondale
542,000
442,000
100,000
Team Sky
466,500
829,500
-363,000
BMC Racing Team
448,000
723,500
-275,500
FDJ.fr
423,000
446,500
-23,500
Giant-Shimano
394,000
449,000
-55,000
Team 8 Up
387,600
37,500
350,100
Trek Factory Racing
308,000
580,500
-272,500
NetApp - Endura
302,500
156,500
146,000
MTN-Qhubeka
252,500
154,000
98,500
IAM Cycling
229,000
294,500
-65,500
Lampre-Merida
227,000
485,500
-258,500
The "biggest loser" isn't even in the top 20 anymore: Garmin Sharp has dropped from 596k down to 172k. Belkin also dropped out of the top 20, went from 538k to 207k.
The Criterium du Dauphine is the last big race of the season for the team around Bernar. They'll be joined by Birtz, runner-up in the TdF and Vuelta last year. We'll be fighting for the positions behind the two big favourites Quintana and Kwiatkowski, who are both preparing for the Tour de France.
Van Garderen wins the prologue ahead of Rowan Dennis and Castroviejo. The flat stages 2 and 4 go to Caleb Ewan, the young Australian is turning into a top sprinter. Stage 3 ended with several steep hills up to 15%. Quintana put on a show of force and wins by 59 seconds ahead of a group of 13 riders including Birtz and Bernar. Reichenbach and Olesen are another minute back, the peloton lost 7:34. Stage 5 was flat until a cat. 2 and a cat. 1 hill. A group of 10 riders made it across including our 4 best riders. Kwiatek wins the stage, Quintana is 2nd, Bardet 3rd.
On the first of the two mountain stages we sent Hansen into the breakaway, he had taken it easy so far and was over 20 minutes down overall. He was easily the best climber in the group, but he was caught on the final Mont Bisanne. Quintana and Kwiatkowski proved to be the strongest, with the Colombian winning the stage by half a bike length. Our riders were best of the rest, taking 3rd through to 5th and 8th place, now all of them are in the top 10 overall.
Foure has recently improved his climbing to 77, so it was a perfect stage for him to be in the breakaway, especially since nobody came close to his climbing ability. The peloton wasn't bothered by him and he won by 16:05 over Quintana, who gained nearly a minute against Kwiatek and our best riders.
The final stage was a flat ITT and fairly long, 42.5 km. Quintana easily defended his lead to with the Dauphine he rode a good time trial, 9th, 43 seconds behind winner Dennis. Kwiatkowski was 4th and remains runner-up. Birtz was 3rd in the ITT and completes the podium, with Bernar slipping to 4th. Olesen rode pretty well, enough to end up 9th, while Reichenbach drops to 12th place.
Quintana also wins the KoM jersey, Foure was equal on points. Kwiatkowski narrowly beats Quintana to the points jersey. White goes to Birtz, the team rankings by over 48 minutes to Team 8 Up. Ewan, who won two stages and Poels with his 5th place GC finish add much needed WT points to Sky's tally, before the Dauphine they only had 73 points, 15th in the WT team rankings.
It was finally time to let Schuermans and Mohoric off the leash for the Tour de Suisse. With MON 83 and 82 they are our best climbers and we can't wait to see how well they'd do. They are up against Betancur, Pinot, Rolland, Mollema and Rui Costa.
Dominik Nerz nearly caused a surprise victory in the hilly prologue, he was 2nd only behind Mollema. Stage 2 was already a mountain stage with a finish up in Crans Montana. Our Edmondson (MON 78) was part of the breakaway and caught just a few kilometres from the finish line. Betancur wins the stage, 9 seconds ahead of Schuermans and 18 ahead of Mohoric. What a promising start, our duo distanced all the other top riders.
The next stage was just 109 km short but led across two big passes. Edmondson found himself in the breakaway again, came first on the cat. 1 climb and 3rd on the HC climb, he had been overtaken only by Schuermans and Pinot and ended 3rd on the day, just ahead of a group of 5 top riders with Mohoric bringing up the rear. Schuermans won the stage 47 seconds ahead of Pinot and 1:31 ahead of the group and slips into the leader's jersey.
Stage 4 was deceptively easy, only riddled with small lumps. This time we sent Elizondo into the breakaway which was only caught after the flamme rouge. Our team was nearly caught unaware by an attack of the co-favourites 15 km from the finish. But Schuermans, Mohoric and Boothroyd held on and Schuermans surprised again by winning the stage in a sprint against Betancur.
A mass sprint decided the next stage and it was won by Gerard Fauconnier. The Frenchman turned pro in 2016, has been with Ag2r since 2018, winning a T-A stage that year and winning here in Switzerland last year. He went on to win the other mass sprint on stage 8 as well.
Stage 6 ended with a mountaintop finish and we sent our last rider with excellent freshness into the break, Nerz. With MON 77 he was the best climber among the escapees, he only needed to worry about Morton (76). Further back 8 Up led the peloton at an easy 32 effort, by the time Katusha upped the tempo the breakaway was 15 minutes ahead with 50 km to go. Nerz won the stage by 50 seconds over Morton.
Betancur attacked at the foot of the final ascent, but Mohoric and Schuermans managed to catch him again. Schuermans placed a late attack and distanced the two by 36 seconds, further increasing his race lead, it's now exactly 2 minutes. Mohoric moves up to 3rd in the GC, he was nearly 90 seconds faster than Pinot.
A day later Betancur strikes back on a brutally steep final hill, not a speciality for Schuermans or Mohoric. Thankfully, it flattened out at the top and they could keep the gap to 40 seconds and came ahead of Pinot, Rui Costa and Mollema.
The final stage of the Tour de Suisse was a flat ITT of 32.2 km. It's Schuerman's weakness, but Betancur is no better (both TTR 63). While Schuermans did ok, 3:43 behind the winner Talansky, Betancur dropped off the podium entirely, 4:58 back. Mohoric moves up to 2nd, Mollema passes both Pinot and Betancur and is the last man on the podium. Boothroyd was 6th on the day and moves up to 7th overall.
Edmondson takes the climber's jersey, Betancur the points jersey and Boothroyd the white jersey. Team 8 Up wins the team rankings comfortably by over 36 minutes ahead of Ag2r.
Once more our sponsor is extremely happy with our performance and is prepared to increase the wage budget from 435k to 510k/month. 15 contracts are ending this season and we decided to offer 9 riders new contracts, though that number might drop depending on who else accepts our offers.
One man we are letting go is Yohann Chene. We were so excited to hire him two years ago, but despite his great COB 82 (only two riders in the world are better) his other stats are simply too weak, he'll never be able to shine.
We hired two new northern classic specialists, two young Norwegians, and are keeping on Juul-Jensen, we now have 5 riders for the cobblestone races.
Soon after we completed our puncheur team for next season. We're excited to secure the signature of Jason Swolfs, at 24 he already boasts an AVG 77. The other new man will be Wurzer, he's even younger at 23 and rated AVG 75. We kept on Mayordomo and cancelled our offer for Gross. He's been with us his whole career so far, now in his 5th season, he's consistenly performed for us, his WT ranking improved from 111 to 63 to 23 and this could be his best season yet. But he's reached his limit (AVG 76) and we hope Wurzer can become better than him.
Nice 77 at that age is very good
