Before the final day of the season, with just the Giro dell'Emelia to decide everyone's fate, let's take one more look at the rankings and what's at stake. Period and individual rankings will follow with the actual final rankings.
First, we can fairly confidently congratulate the Top 5. With 140 points awarded to the Giro del'Emelia's winner, the 200 point gap between cycleYorkshire and Popo4Ever seems insurmountable. Similarly, Kraftwerk (who made a jump thanks to a strong Tour de Maroc) and Bralirwa should be relatively safe in the Top 10, unless someone at Binance or Carlsberg pulls off a miracle, and the Top 15 seem set as well, given that Assa Abloy has very little scoring potential tomorrow.
The one significant battle in the top half could be for 6th place, which always is a potential promotion spot in case of disbandments in PT. Popo4Ever, UBS and Cedevita are seperated by 56 points and all of them bring strong contenders to Italy in Prevar, Ponzi and Beltan, respectively.
But the biggest thriller plays out at the bottom of the rankings - the relegation battle is wildly close. Just 3 (!!) points seperate Carrefour below the line and Jura - Fiat above it, with Voyagin only another 6 (!!) further ahead. And while Podium Ambition's fate is sealed, Sauber, this month's biggest drop-off, is still well within reach in 23rd place. Philips certainly can’t feel safe, and even Indosat, who jumped up to 18th thanks to Dunbar’s win in Bayern, is not entirely out of the woods yet. This warrants a closer look.
Pos
Last
Team
Total
RD
PpRD
Proj
1
1
Aker - MOT
3740
173
21,62
3784
2
3
Polar
3319
173
19,18
3357
3
5
Duolingo
3285
173
18,99
3323
4
2
Los Pollos Hermanos
3253
173
18,8
3290
5
4
cycleYorkshire
3250
175
18,57
3250
6
6
Team Popo4Ever p/b Nemiroff
3046
173
17,61
3082
7
7
Team UBS
3037
173
17,55
3071
8
9
Cedevita
2990
173
17,28
3024
9
11
Kraftwerk Man Machine
2912
173
16,83
2945
10
8
Bralirwa - Stevens
2871
173
16,6
2905
11
10
Binance Cycling
2756
173
15,93
2788
12
12
Carlsberg - Danske Bank
2744
173
15,86
2776
13
15
Red Bull Zalgiris
2610
173
15,09
2641
14
13
Project: Africa
2563
173
14,82
2594
15
14
Lierse SK - Pizza Ullo PCTeam
2532
173
14,64
2562
16
16
Assa Abloy
2426
173
14,02
2454
17
17
Minions
2288
173
13,23
2315
18
20
Indosat Ooredoo
2107
173
12,18
2132
19
21
Philips - Force India
2033
173
11,75
2056
20
24
Voyagin - Bird
2004
173
11,58
2027
21
18
Jura - Fiat
1998
173
11,55
2021
22
22
Carrefour - ESPN
1995
173
11,53
2018
23
19
Sauber Petronas Racing
1954
173
11,29
1976
24
23
Podium Ambition
1800
175
10,29
1801
25
25
Tryg - Ritter Sport
1666
173
9,63
1685
26
26
Eurosport x GCN
1438
175
8,22
1439
A closer look
5 teams are within 54 points of the feared 22nd and desired 21st place, and Indosat, despite a gap of a good 100 points, is theoretically still in danger as well. The important thing now is their scoring at the Giro dell'Emelia. Here's who they're bringing to score the most crucial points of the season:
18. Indosat Ooredoo
Jensen
80
2107 Points
Dunbar
76
Setiawa
74
19. Philips - Force India
Kelderman
82
2033 Points
Teuns
78
David
75
20. Voyagin - Bird
Kinoshita
83
2004 Points
Shirota
75
Lyu
73
21. Jura - Fiat
Moscon
79
1998 Points
Pernsteiner
77
Masnada
76
---
---
---
22. Carrefour - ESPN
Bakelants
80
1995 Points
Gautier
78
Nzeke
76
23. Sauber Petronas Racing
Van Garderen
81
1954 Points
Slagter
79
Grossschartner
77
Some of the absolute best puncheurs of the division will be the center pieces in this drama. Philips and Voyagin should feel good about having Kelderman and Kinoshita lead the charge, but neither has been consistent. And while none of the teams below them has a leader as strong as them, they all bring better depth. Will that be enough, though? It all comes down to one race - good luck to all of them!
I hope it's alright that I posted a mini-preview about Emelia without the actual preview being up, but I thought it would be important context for the rankings
From Bralirwa's perspective, the last few months have been a downward spiral, but luckily, that spiral started in first place so we're still in a good place I'll post a full season review in my HQ at some point, but it's gonna be a positive one for sure.
Incredibly close relegation race, not sure if there's ever been something like this.
Absolutely horrible month for us. 48 points out of 10 RDs is not even close to good, especially given that 8 of them were a PTHC stage race which *should* yield big points.
Plus, both Indosat and especially Voyagin had ridiculously good races lately, while Penasa showed exactly the PTHC overperformance I was hoping for by Quintana all season long. Carrefour did well with breakaways in Morocco, and if all opponents do well and you do shitty, well, that's not enough.
At least we're still above the cut-off line, but with Moscon's no-shows in the last few races, I can't see us stay up there. His advantage could be that Bakelants has even worse acceleration and pretty bad RES, but I guess it's much more likely that we'll go down again.
Which honestly wouldn't be a real surprise, as every preview had us deep down in the relegation zone. And looking at the team, I'll have to admit that bar Quintana, that's rather CT stuff. So it's actually a big success that we're fighting for staying up until the very last race - but still disappointing we're down to 21st after we were 3 spots higher a month (and a potential high-scoring race) ago.
Congrats to the Top5, although I still hope for a miracle-like race by UBS which would allow them to go up once more.
This will be a thrilling final race seeing the standings and the fight to avoid relegation! As it stands, and seeing the lineups for Emelia, Sauber and Jura must fear relegation the most, I think. Though, all it takes will be one great daily form...
Glad that we are back into a spot to potentially promote given some of our runs this season. 3 points is a little, but given we relegated back to the CT 2 years back from ~15 point difference it almost feels destined we will find ourselves back there again.
Here's to hoping the big veteran Jan Bakelandts can pull out some magic on the last day; regardless though, big changes are coming and are needed. CT or not.
Got to say to relegate after being seemingly comfortably above the line until this late in the season would definitely hurt. It's been a fun team to follow and looked safe for the longest time but we unfortunately hit the worst form of the season at the most crucial time.
This would have to be the closest relegation fight in MG history right? Especially with it being for two spots below the line and so almost 1/4 of teams involved. Madness.
Dunbar saved our asses and gave us a nice little buffer, but all it takes is a bad day from Jensen and a 1-2-3 of TVG, Kino and Jelderman or something and we’re back to CT for the first time in 7 years. Really hope that Sauber can get enough out of Emilia to stay up. Thanks for the update Cunego!
Insane battle at the bottom. Massive update cunego, thanks for the effort, it helps us clueless earthlings understand what's going on in this last decisive race. Most of the relegation managers are at least likeable charachters so it feels kind of unfair to see even dome of them go down. Anyway, it's going to be an entertaining report. Good luck everyone!
As for us it seems we're going up again. Would have liked to take 2md in the rankings but that Bayern race really screwed us over I guess. Let's see how Emillia goes.
Thanks for the update, cunego. Feels amazing to be fourth after a rather strange season with many no-shows but also some out of this world performances by leaders Manninen and Zmorka Good luck to everyone in the final race of the season.
Thanks for the update! Top 15 goal seems set for us thanks to AKA, so at least we'll go 1/5 on goals this year. I'll go more in depth with ny reflections in the final thread, but 12th is both about right and a disappointment after our great start.
Best of luck to the relegation fighters in Emilia. None of you guys deserve to go down, so it will be tough to see that happen.
RIP Exxon Duke, David Veilleux, Double Feature, and Monster Energy
I'll post a full season review in my HQ at some point, but it's gonna be a positive one for sure.
![imgur.com/KlJUqDx.jpg[/img[img]]https://imgur.com/yUygrQ.jpg](https://imgur.com/KlJUqDx.jpg[/img[img]]https://imgur.com/yUygrQ.jpg)
