redordead wrote:
A lot of one day races on that calendar. I approve

We took a conscious decision to have Kelderman concentrate on classics, as we believe that is his strong point. Same as last season, Wilco's results will go a long way in deciding how well we do. Kelderman will lead us in Liege-Bastogne-Liege. He will also be responsible for chasing three of our goals this season, including the Win goal at Milano - Torino.

**Races marked in bold are Goal races.

Completely opposite to Kelderman, Penasa almost exclusively will ride in stage races this season as our leader in the mountains. He will be a wildcard rider in Milan San Remo. While we did consider the Tour of America as a possible race for Penasa, we were not comfortable putting so many of our eggs in a single basket.

Van Asbroeck is given the dual duty this of leading the sprints and also either co-leading or leading in certain cobbles races this season. He will lead us at our first ever Monument at Milan - San Remo and also lead in our home goal race at Rheden GP.

**Races marked in bold are Goal races.

David will lead us in the Northern Classics, sometimes sharing it with Van Asbroeck and sometimes on his own. He will also join the latter in certain flat races and has also been given the important job of being a super-domestique to Kelderman in pure puncher races.

**Races marked in bold are Goal races.

Andrew Talansky's main role in the team will be to support Penasa in the mountains and be an important part of the TTT setup. He will also get to lead in the Tour of Ukraine.

Dylan Teuns will act as the super-domestique to Kelderman in most of the latter's races, with a few leadership opportunities at Tour Down Under, Tour de Pologne and Balkans International.

	CT	PCT	PCT	CT
Name	'17	'18	'19	'20	Total
Wilco Kelderman			636	608	1244
Lahcen Saber		661	511		1172
Sergio Luis Henao Montoya		617			617
Nico Keinath				472	472
Rui Costa		343			343
David Per (Loan)	119	197			316
Marcel Wyss	289				289
Romain Bardet	185		64	39	288
Florentino Marquez			279		279
Michel Kreder	226			12	238

No surprises here as Kelderman leapfrogs Saber to become our highest scorer, despite a season in the CT. Keinath moves up to 4th in the table with Kreder still hanging on to the Top 10.

Name	'17	'18	'19	'20	Total
Ronan Van Zandbeek	60	75	64		199
Romain Bardet	52		66	62	180
Piet Allegaert	14	94	54		162
Kevin Inkelaar			87	74	161
Jasper Bovenhuis			76	70	146
David Per (Loan)	63	73			136
Wout Poels		65	70		135
Rob Ruijgh	60	68			128
Jaoa Costa	57	70			127
Remco Te Brake		58	61		119

Van Zandbeek still leads the RD count, despite having been released at the start of last season. With Inkellar out on loan, Bovenhuis claim the top spot at the end of this season. The next highest active rider is Schelling on 94.

Kelderman is well clear at the top with Henao and Saber in the next two spots. Keinath catapulted himself to 4th on the basis of last season.

No one can touch Boev Wyss still is the best among the paid riders for us with that spectacular season in 2017, our first as a team. Dumoulin is a surprising 3rd on this list, while Keinath and Paprstka find themselves in the Top 5 after a great season last time around. Kelderman takes over from Saber here as well as the rider having taken home most wages from us so far.

Kelderman becomes our most successful stage racer on the back of last season. Krieger and Dumoulin are the only others to have won a stage race for the team. Keinath leapfrogs Kreder to now have the highest GC and stage podiums in Stage Races. Storer picked up our first ever U25 win last season since the time of Per.

Kelderman moved ahead of Henao as our most successful Classics rider. Otherwise, only Paprstka and Van Lerberghe added to that tally last season.

Kelderman is well and truly ahead of everyone else in terms of overall success. Keinath though managed 12 podiums in just one season! Despite being a free rider, Boev is now the second most successful sprinter in our history.

Carrying on from what was mentioned in the last table, Keinath managed a podium for every 4 days of racing last season, which is quite astonishing! Kelderman isn't far behind at a shade over 5 and a half. Boev at 8 shows just how good of a pickup he was in the draft.

Nemolito wrote:
A little bit of history never hurt nobody. Boev is a hero. Kelderman has a hard season ahead of him, but I believe in him and truly hope he can add many more points to his tally for the next update at the end of the season.

We go into the first race of the season with Van Asbroeck our expected leader for the sprint. Paprstka and Jans are expected to be with him at the business end with riders like Dumoulin and Bvenhuis, among others, expected to the lay the foundation. Not a lot of high hopes with a strong sprint field expected to show up. If we get into the Top 10, it will be a good result.

Dumoulin drops out from the DUC startlist, with Teuns coming in as co-leader for this race. He will share leadership with Van Asbroeck. We have covered for situations wherein the race becomes selective or otherwise. We hope Teuns can utilize his attacking prowess in case of the former, while we believe Van Asbroeck can hang onto the front if the latter happens. The support staff is strong and should be well suited to the profiles.

Kelderman returns to the scene of his C1 victory from last season. We hope the race does not actually turn out the same and that we can see a true puncher battle (TT riders allowing) on the slopes. The support cast isn't the strongest but the short hills encouraged us to go for a less hills heavy line-up.

We did not send a rider into the break and it was a quiet race for us till the closing stages. Van Asbroeck got himself into a good position inside the final kilometer and launched a well-timed sprint to make up places and finish 4th.

1	Fabio Silvestre	Bralirwa - Stevens	1h46'24
4	Tom Van Asbroeck	Philips - Force India	s.t.
49	Roy Jans	Philips - Force India	s.t.
76	Tomas Paprstka	Philips - Force India	s.t.
84	Marten Kooistra	Philips - Force India	s.t.
121	Ide Schelling	Philips - Force India	s.t.
128	Jasper Bovenhuis	Philips - Force India	s.t.
143	Daniel Moricz	Philips - Force India	s.t.
185	Tom Dumoulin	Philips - Force India	s.t.

A good start to the season for us. Van Asbroeck showed himself really well in his first outing in our colours. The team did a fine job to keep him out of trouble before the finale.

Van Asbroeck continued his good start to the season, picking up a 5th place on Stage 1.



Paprstka joined the break on Stage 2. He was caught with 7.5 km to go. Van Asbroeck couldn't get into the Top 10.

Another breakaway appearance on Stage 3 followed, this time by Bovenhuis but we were not among the stage contenders here either.

The rest of the race was disappointing as we failed to make any impact.

1	Simone Ponzi	Team UBS	18h38'13
18	Tom Van Asbroeck	Philips - Force India	+ 1'26
53	Dylan Teuns	Philips - Force India	+ 2'05
73	Roy Jans	Philips - Force India	+ 3'16
91	Tomas Paprstka	Philips - Force India	+ 3'41
103	Jasper Bovenhuis	Philips - Force India	+ 3'45
125	Marten Kooistra	Philips - Force India	+ 4'51
158	Daniel Moricz	Philips - Force India	+ 6'02
161	Ide Schelling	Philips - Force India	+ 6'31

A poor race from us as Van Asbroeck failed to gain any time beyond the first stage and Teuns got relegated to support duties and was very passive throughout.

We kept Kelderman in a position on Stage 1 but he was very passive in the closing stages. He did finish in the group of favourites though, along with Zoidl.

Zoidl rode a good TT to get himself into 10th place in the GC after Stage 2. Kelderman was down in 17th but just a minute behind the leader.

Lafay joined the break on Stage 3 but couldn't get any points. Kelderman made the move to follow the first attack which came on the climb to the finish but he wasn't strong enough and eventually got passed by many riders, Zoidl lost time as well, which put paid to our chances of having a decent race.

1	Eduard Alexander Beltran	Cedevita	8h01'08
15	Wilco Kelderman	Philips - Force India	+ 1'39
16	Riccardo Zoidl	Philips - Force India	+ 1'46
60	Charles Anguilet	Philips - Force India	+ 7'19
77	Roy Jans	Philips - Force India	+ 8'12
86	Gijs Leemreize	Philips - Force India	+ 9'36
99	Victor Lafay	Philips - Force India	+ 11'05
117	Tom Dumoulin	Philips - Force India	+ 14'26
127	Jasper Bovenhuis	Philips - Force India	+ 16'42

Another poor race and a really poor first outing for Kelderman. Zoidl did well till the final stage got too tough for him. We did manage to get some minor points from U25s, with Leemreize scoring his first ever points, and also Lafay contributing. Hope the hills get better than this in the future.

The cobbles double header sees Van Asbroeck go to Belgium to try to continue his decent start to the season. We hope he can survive the cobbles near the front with help from the team and then use his sprinting skills to get a decent result.

David leads in the other half of the cobbles clash, and he should have decent skills to match this course. Besides him and Bovenhuis, who is also well suited to this race, the team is quite weak.

Paprstka and Bovenhuis return as leaders to what were happy hunting grounds last season, i.e. the cobbles. We hope Paprstka can regain his fine form from last season.

An experimental line-up with the course not expected to help Kelderman too much. Talansky leads for the only time this season, and we hope his skill combo can prove useful for this race. Zoidl is also here and we are hopeful of a repeat of Hong Kong with his performance.

The next opportunity for Kelderman to impress comes in New Zealand. This race should suit him much more than the parcours in Hong Kong and we hope he can make use of the same. A moderately strong support cast will be there to try to get him into a good position for the closing stages. We don't really have anyone for the flat stages but hope the likes of David, Jans or Paprstka can cause some chaos.

Our first appearance in a Monument, via a wildcard, and everyone is free to do what they want! This is meant to be a fun outing for the team, and to see how they match up to the top division's stars.

Jans joined the break. Van Asbroeck tried to join them midway through the race but the effort only tired him out and he couldn't hang on to the peloton in the closing stages. Once Jans was caught, we paid the price of our naivete and returned empty handed from this race.

David was top favourite but inexplicably Bovenhuis attacked midway and left David without a strong helper. David followed the initial moves but missed the winning move. He finished 7th as our only points scorer.

Paprstka decided to jon the break midway through the race. This basically put paid to his chances as the break was caught. Bovenhuis was our best finisher in 18th, with Paprstka only managing 28th.

While not getting a great start, Zoidl and Talansky lost only about half a minute on Stage 1. We didn't do well with Talansky in 54th our best result on Stage 2. Henttala did very well to finish 3rd on Stage 3.


Zoidl also finished 10th on Stage 3, pushing him up to 14th in the GC. Talansky finished 29th.

We got off to a slow start on Stage 1 but Kelderman won Stage 2 and took the GC lead.


We stayed safe on Stage 3 but Kelderman was poor on Stage 4 and dropped to 6th in the GC. David did decently well to move up to 25th in the GC. Stage 5 was uneventful. Kelderman picked up minor points for the KOM with Lafay and Leemreize doing the same in the U25s.

Our first of two wildcards this season didn't yield any joy but it was a nice experience to participate in our first ever Monument.

redordead wrote:
Welcome back

Van Asbroeck was too far down in the leadup of the Stage 1 sprint and managed 13th.

He was much better positioned on Stage 2 but fell away in the final kilometer.

Moricz joined the break on Stage 3 but was caught before the 10 kilometer banner. Van Asbroeck was badly positioned again in the sprint, and paid the price again with no top result.

Rinse and repeat for Stage 4. 23rd in the GC was our only return from this race.

Dumoulin in 28th was our best result in the Prologue. Sigh...

Kelderman missed the winning moves on Stage 2 but finished strongly from the pack, just the sprinters and in 9th.

We worked a lot to make the race hard in the closing stages. Kelderman attacked on the final climb but was caught. He finished 7th from the pack sprint, with one rider staying away for the stage win.

Dumoulin did better to finish in 8th in the Epilogue.

Kelderman finished 9th in the GC. Lafay claimed 4th in the KOM with Teuns in 6th. Lafay also finished 5th in the U25s. We finished 9th in the Teams classification.

We didn't start well, losing 45 seconds in the TTT on Stage 1.

No gaps with the reduced bunch sprint on Stage 2, with Kelderman claiming 10th.

Kelderman was among the early attackers in the closing stages of Stage 3 but they would get caught before the finish. Kelderman finished 9th.

The ITT on Stage 4 was terrible for us!

Stage 5 went to the break and none of our riders were good enough to stay with the top contenders.

Zoidl, Teuns and Kelderman all joined the break on Stage 6.



The numbers game paid dividends as a lot of good domestique work by Kelderman allowed Teuns to use his freshness and launch a final attack to take the stage win.



Teuns moved up to 21st in the GC with Kelderman in 29th. Schelling finished 6th in the U25 classification.

Sagadin joined the break for us. They would be caught in the closing stages. Jans was the only rider strong enough to remain in the front group and finished 12th.

Three star favourite Kelderman finished with the 16 man lead group in the reduced bunch sprint to the line. He finished 16th! And that's all we got.

We didn't send any sprinters, so Stage 1 was quiet. Same with Stage 2.

Penasa stuck with the front group on the vital Stage 3 till 6 kilometers to go. He couldn't follow after that and rode his own race to finish a disappointing 11th.

Penasa would lose more time on Stage 4, with Talansky having to drop back to help him and losing time himself in the process.

Stage 5 went to the break. We were not interested in anything.

We did fine on the hard Stage 6, with Raileanu finishing a strong 6th and Penasa getting 8th.

Penasa finished 11th in the GC, Talansky 20th, Raileanu 29th and Henttala 49th. Schelling finished 9th in the U25s with the team getting 6th.

Paprstka launched a mid-stage attack. Van Asbroeck also did the same some kilmeters later. They were caught and dropped for their efforts. David stayed in touch with the lead group till 7 kilometers to go. He did stick to a good pace till the finish and claimed 5th, our best result since the season opening race in Australia. Paprstka also finished strongly, getting a 9th place for his efforts.

Moricz joined the break. After a hard race, both Van Asbroeck and David managed to stay with the lead group in the reduced bunch sprint. Unluckily for us, neither had the strength to sprint and only managed 10th and 13th.Bovenhuis finished 18th.