Every CT team was racing once or twice today, on the day where the last open questions were answered.
Let's first talk about Giro dell'Emilia, where Air New Zealand, Bonduelle, Caja Rural, Colombini, Eddie Stobart, Staffbase and Tafjord tried their luck - which was the highest number of CT teams in an HC race all season long!
And three of them actually did pretty well - I'd even say almost equally well. In fact, their best riders were ranked 9th, 10th and 12th, which definitely is a good result for CT!
The best scoring team were Tafjord, whose leader Hagen took 9th place, which was worth 31 points.
Next are Bordeaux, led by a surprisingly strong Rodriguez, with Iturria and Doubey adding 5 depth points each. 28 points for the Franco-Basque team!
And in 3rd place, we have the final scoring CT team (yes, the four others left Italy with a zero-pointer in the bag), which is Colombini. Betancourt took a strong 10th place, which is worth 26 points.
In Zurich, we then had all CT teams but Air New Zealand on the start line. All but 5 participating CT teams scored, whereof BNZ surely are by far the biggest negative surprise, with Edmondson leaving empty-handed.
On the other side of the rankings, we have Bordeaux, leading the table with their 50 points for Wackermann's sprint win!
Runner-up Masnada had to settle for 35 points; however, Schmid and Moscon added some more points for Jura, who score 46 points in their home race.
3rd place finisher Luchshenko's Bianchi had an even stronger depth result, with four riders in the scoring position (two of them on the final two spots), and they're concluding the season with 33 points in the Metzgete.
Overall, Bordeaux clearly were the strongest team on the final day of the season, scoring 78 points in these two races. Tafjord being the best in Emilia and number 4 in Zurich ended up with 57 points, whereas Jura's 46 points scored in Zurich are worth 3rd place.
Here are the full numbers for those who might be interested:
Emilia
Metzgete
Total
1
Bordeaux Metropole - Euskotren
28
50
78
2
Tafjord Kraft
31
26
57
3
Jura GIANTS
0
46
46
4
Bianchi - Panerai
0
33
33
5
Colombini-Adler Aalterpaint
26
0
26
6
Eddie Stobart
0
24
24
7
Caja Rural Cycling Team
0
22
22
8
Le Creuset
0
22
22
9
Tryg - Gobik
0
19
19
10
BWT Hyundai N Cycling
0
13
13
11
McCormick Pro Cycling
0
12
12
12
Bonduelle - Eesti Energia
0
12
12
13
Staffbase - BHP
0
5
5
14
Glanbia
0
3
3
15
BNZ-Superhero Racing
0
0
0
16
Oktal Pharma - TotalTV
0
0
0
17
Pas Normal Studios - Mikkeller
0
0
0
18
Air New Zealand
0
0
0
19
Podium Ambition
0
0
0
Final Teams Ranking
The first two spots were basically set in stone barring any major miracles - which didn't happen. Which means that Jura GIANTS win the division with a total of 2,158 points - which is 653 more than McCormick in 2nd place. What looked like a close fight for a long time ended up being a boring solo by the Swiss, for whom pretty much everything fell into place in the last couple of months. One year in CT was enough, they instantly go back up to PCT.
McCormick's long-term project promoting mainly American riders finally came to fruition - even though their (by far) greatest talent is out on PT loan this year! They were among the pre-season favorites for the first two spots, and that's exactly where they ended up! Congratulations!
Glanbia then opened the door for a last-minute Colombini attack by scoring just 3 points today, but even though Betancourt did well, the rest of the team didn't. Hence, the Irishmen remain in 3rd place, and just like McCormick finally achieve promotion in their 4th year! Not many actually had them as serious contenders, but the pretty ITT/TTT-heavy CT calendar perfectly suited their main strength, and they massively capitalized on that. Congratulations as well to Ireland!
The promotion of Colombini might come as an even bigger surprise - especially given that their top signing Saber wasn't really consistent in previous years. However, the 2022 season probably was his best, and he ended up scoring more than 50% of his team's points - no question about who was their hero this year! They might have a rebuild to do for next year with their leader declining, though, and we wish them all the best for this undertaking! But for now, congratulations on a fantastic inaugural season!
Tryg didn't look great for most of the year - but then they had that massive Tour of America, alongside some great performances in the Middle East, Sun Tour, or also their Frankfurt win. This streak of great results made them rise from nowhere to the final direct promotion spot, and just like Jura, they bounce back after one year in CT. Despite their top rider Schlegel underperforming. Congratulations for getting back up!
For BWT and BNZ, ending up 6th and 7th, it looked like one of them could actually achieve automatic promotion - until the Tour of America and Tryg's huge scoring came. So the final day was all about holding onto those positions - and hoping to still get promotion via disbands, although nobody really hopes for that (that's my own hope, at least). BWT end up over 150 points behind Tryg, so they didn't even come close to the Top 5 in the end.
BNZ are another 71 points behind - and actually are lucky to remain in 7th place after today's races! Caja Rural came very, very close, trailing by a measly 3 points in the end! But honestly, it wouldn't have felt right to see BNZ drop just because of Edmondson's no-show.
The fight for 9th and 10th ended up being very close as well - thanks to Hagen's (final?) big performance in Emilia! His 9th place was enough to pull Tafjord past Oktal Pharma - by just 5 points! If they can perform at this level right from the start next year, the Norwegians should finally be in promotion contention as well!
Bianchi looked like promotion candidates for quite a while as well, but in the end were lacking the big scoring cobbled races they mostly had in spring. This even saw them drop out of the Top 10, despite showing some great racing in Zurich today. And it's really unlucky for them to end up 11th, given that 7th place is just 65 points away...
Behind the Italians, there's a big gap down to Pas Normal in 12th place, who are the first team ending up below 1,000 points. They were actually almost caught by Bonduelle today, but the Franco-Estonian outfit ends up 8 points behind.
Another 70 points further down, we get Air New Zealand, who didn't seriously have to fear about their 14th place today.
And on the final Top 15 spot, we see Bordeaux, whose great day saw them gain two spots to leapfrog both Staffbase and Le Creuset! And it wasn't even a close affair in the end, as they end up 50 points clear of Staffbase! Le Creuset, on the other hand, miss out on 16th by just 5 points...
Last but not least, the bottom 2. Their final ranking was pretty much set in stone already - and given Podium Ambition's zero-pointer, they weren't even close to gaining ground.
On the contrary, Eddie Stobart had one of their stronger days of the year, getting a little closer to the Caribbean outfit - yet still missing out by 45 points.
And that's all - here are the final 2022 CT rankings!
There's not much to say about the Top 10 that hasn't be said before. Lahcen Saber is the King of CT, by an almost 300 points margin!
Best of the rest is Colin Stüssi, who also takes the title of best CT stage racer. Andrew Talansky and Lawrence Warbasse ended up within 50 points from the Swiss, though, showing some great racing as well. Vegard Breen remains in 5th place as CT's top (pure) cobbler.
Fausto Masnada used the final day of the year to improve from 8th to 6th, moving past sprinters Max Kanter and Wouter Wippert. Szymon Rekita is the 3rd Jura rider in the Top 10, as the division's top TTer, whereas Michal Schlegel rounds out the Top 10 - which might be slightly disappointing, but he still contributed some big points to Tryg's promotion campaign.
Narrowly missing out on the Top 10 is Ian Boswell, who had a stellar start of the year, only to rather quickly fade later on. With Sepp Kuss in 12th place, McCormick have three in the Top 12 - plus Keough in 16th. He dropped out of the Top 15 due to Hoelgaard's rise from 18th to 14th, making it three Tryg riders in the Top 15 as well.
Congrats, Fabianski, as well as the other promoting teams.
Special shootout to McCormick, who finally made the big step and will have McNulty maxed out for it too. Great to see Boswell playing such a big role in the promotion too.
alexkr00 wrote:
Special shootout to McCormick, who finally made the big step and will have McNulty maxed out for it too. Great to see Boswell playing such a big role in the promotion too.
Thank you, not sure I love the word "finally" in there but we will take it . Boswell did all we could ask particularly given he never had a single quality domestique.
Nice to have 4 riders all from our home nation in the top 20, promoting with all US leaders was one of my goals. And technically we are one year ahead of schedule since my original plan called for a 2023 push with McNulty, but got worried about fitting him under a CT wage cap and so Warbasse was the audible. He did what we needed, although neither he or I can be happy with him getting beaten by Talansky, but that is a small issue.
Congrats to all the other promoting team and I don't like to root for disbands but feel like two to get Ivan and Jakstar up would be fair. A lot of great new managers this year so hope they will all be back.
Congrats to all promoting teams, who knows how much will this be
Us finishing 16th I cant call that a success obviously but I am aware why this became like that, more to that at our HQ
Looking forward already to next season and hopefully getting better reults then.
Ulrich Ulriksen wrote:
Congrats to all the other promoting team and I don't like to root for disbands but feel like two to get Ivan and Jakstar up would be fair. A lot of great new managers this year so hope they will all be back.
As far as I remember the PCT division used to consist of 26 teams, but this season was reduced to 24 due to lot of disbands and the very shallow CT team pool last season. I know it's up to roturn to decide if the PCT division will be back to 26 teams or stay at 24, but to be very honest I'd prefer to promote via expansion rather than wait on a team above me to "die". I've been down that road once and wasn't pretty (wasn't prepared for the PCT challenge either - thanks Preidler). Still, 6th place (150 points short of Top 5 - dang it) is something that I can be very proud despite being pessimistic about my chances.
Congrats to all promoting teams - you really deserve it. As for me - it will be a very tough renewal season since the fate of my team is outside my control. I'd say that this renewal season would be even more difficult than 2019.
Huge congrats to Jura for the division win! Congrats to all the promoting teams, and a word especially for McCormick and Glanbia as their long term regional projects make the step up. Great to see Talansky contributing greatly for the same. A word on Colombini also, making it up at the first go is a great achievement, and powered by another former Philips favourite in Saber. Tryg made the right moves at the best time of the season and snatch the final spot after a difficult start to the season. See you all in PCT next season
alexkr00 wrote:
Special shootout to McCormick, who finally made the big step and will have McNulty maxed out for it too. Great to see Boswell playing such a big role in the promotion too.
Thank you, not sure I love the word "finally" in there but we will take it . Boswell did all we could ask particularly given he never had a single quality domestique.
Congratulations to Jura on the win, and to all promotors as well. Strong result by newbie Adler to finish fourth, incredible stuff. The waiting game begins for BNZ now. Although of course I hope as few people disband as possible, I would love to see them go up as well.
Also a small source of pride for me are the three riders I sold to CT last year and they are all in the top 30 of the individual ranking: Saber 1st, Rajovic 17th, Alarcon 25th
Congrats to the fellow promotees. I only just learned how CT works really and now I have to jump up a level just as my riders turn 55 years old...
I can realistically admit that we got very lucky with Talansky outperforming and the Time Trials falling nicely..going to need some new ideas (and riders)
Special shout out to Ulrich and Fabianski who made the season for the CT. Solidarity to all those waiting to see if there any extra spots. I came 9th in my first season and 8 ended going up. It does seem more stable though at the moment
Ezeefreak wrote:
Congrats to all promoting teams, who knows how much will this be
Us finishing 16th I cant call that a success obviously but I am aware why this became like that, more to that at our HQ
Looking forward already to next season and hopefully getting better reults then.
Quite the same for us.
15th seems about right, as we've been here most part of the season. It would have been a disappointment to miss that - sorry for Staffbase and Le Creuset.
Next year will be tough, with only one goal realized, and more realistic goals to take, but with what I've learned this year, I maybe will able to make the most of it.
Thanks again for all the rankings Fab, and congrats to the promoting teams. Also nice to have Jura and McCormick as 1-2.
“...the secret of the Great Stories is that they have no secrets. The Great Stories are the ones you have heard and want to hear again. The ones you can enter anywhere and inhabit comfortably."
A. Roy
Kim Le Court was a Top100 Rider!!! And we topped 2pprd! Those are both pretty solid returns from this season. I tried to track all the breakaways we made but that really became far too much to keep up with. Scattered in one or two nice finishes (including a pesky KoM Jersey win which adds a default 10k onto renewals, grrr...). But i can't really say anything about this season. Threw it aside way back to go all-in on the Islanders, knowing we'd be set of something historically bad as a result. And it was, so success!
Congrats to the promoting teams. All of them, be it 5 or 7 or however many. And the rest of you better beware of the coming surge. New kit, new skills and a new hunger. The 2023 season will be a good one for T3A.
Impressive Top5, with 3 pre-season locks, an amazing turnaroung by Glanbia and the smartest transfer of the season in Saber. Loving to see how those sides do in PCT.
Thanks to Fabi for all the ranking updates this season (though they weren't that godd for us) and congratulations to him, Ulrich, McC, Kaiser and lief to promotion. Well and probably to everyone else, too, given there are only two teams behind us (and TMM doesn't even care about that this season).
We got an exciting last day of racing with a nice result, though ezee got that couple of points more he needed to stay ahead and Imladrik had a stellar day to surpass us. But can't be too disappointed as they both deserve it for his organisational and reporting work (in Imladriks case) and ezees industrious designing of great jerseys (including ours).
17th gives us much space for getting better next season and I can't wait for it to begin!
I hope to see all of you in the CT circuit next season (including those promoted, probably just less often than the others) and good luck with your renewals!
This is amazing. For the first time I can actually reply with this without having precautions. We are promoting to the PCT! God, it's a dream come true. I had joked around about this to friends and mentors as early as the day I signed Saber. "I'll kill it first year and get promotion." Was a funny joke among us until I started getting serious. I never spoke those words in public, for fear of being ridiculed when we eventually wouldn't promote. And here we are. The most amazing thing to me is that we started our first ranking update in the top 5, and never gave it away until the very last day.
I started flying when Saber stunned everyone in Australia, winning the Down Under Classic. It went on and on, even though not every month was as positive we still scored pretty consistently. Lets also not forget, King Saber has won CT! In doing so he becomes the first African to finish on top. A great achievement for his last year at his peak.
It was an honor battleing against you all this season, especially against my fellow promotees. Even if it wasn't so much a battle as it was me stumbling behind the top 3
A special thanks to all the organizers and reports who make this possible for us. And a special thanks to Fabi for all his ranking updates he gifts us every once in a while.
It was a cracking year, onto the next! See you soon, friends. <3
So, finally all reports and ranking updates are done, so I have time to relax - and to comment
First of all, thanks for the congrats!
The final rankings clearly state that we had a fantastic season overall. It's the biggest gap between 1st and 2nd across all divisions, and this despite CT having the lowest point scale (and the smallest gaps e.g. between 1st and 2nd).
But I have to admit that I wasn't really happy at times. I knew I had a very strong roster - likely the strongest in the division - but especially in the first months, the riders often failed to live up to their reputation. Sure, Hong Kong was great, but Moscon failed over and over again no matter the division. Especially the C2 hilly classics were frustrating - and in the meantime, McCormick scored big time with Boswell.
We were then able to win in Catalunya - but Stüssi finishing in 10th place also left a bad feeling for the rest of the year. And he had quite some failures indeed, especially in classics. Again, no matter the category, he was just bad.
Fortunately, we had Chavanne and the sprinters early on, saving the day in Jelajah or USA PCC. Mäder also had his best (well, his only good) race of the year in California, taking an unexpected 2nd place.
Romandie was another bummer as well, missing out on our 2nd goal of the year already - with Stüssi failing badly in the ITT. I often regretted having thrown that training money out of the window - seemingly.
We then saw Moscon's resurrection in Chile, winning the same stage as last year in copy&paste style. It was one out of just three good races by him all year long, though (the others being Milano - Torino and Euskal Bizikleta).
Then it was up to the TTers to shine. Olympia's Tour went pretty well, only losing out to Glanbia's insanely deep team. Rekita was slightly disappointing, but Marchewka took a GC podium.
Rekita being slightly disappointing was also the theme for the next TT-heavy races, Tropicale and Arab, where he failed to deliver the expected Top 5 result in both.
The climbers had Tour of Vancouver, where Stüssi once again got beaten, but at least finished 2nd. This was way worse in Vineyards, where our climbers didn't do anything. That was the race that made me really angry, as it felt purely random.
In Andorra he simply wasn't competitive enough in that field, which was roughly OK. Instead, he won Trentino - which finally was a goal accomplished.
In general, starting with Trentino, the rest of the season was mostly amazing. 2nd in Middle East, a stage win in Bayern (with Mäder once again doing nothing, however), Moscon's best classic result of the year in Torino. In between, zero-pointers in Frankfurt and sadly Lugano, plus another GC-wise disappointing race in Morocco (I just say Mäder...).
And then, the great, the historic 1-2 in Herald Sun Tour, clearly one of this year's big highlights. A great team performance in Euskal. And then an almost perfect Züri Metzgete, where one rider was just a tad stronger than Masnada.
So, lots of highlights, some complete no-shows. Both somehow remain in my memory; the great moments which are pretty satisfying, but also the frequent failures on C1/HC level, leaving lots of doubts about us being competitive in PCT next year. I guess that given our margin on McCormick, we surely have some work to do (as any promoting team) - but we should be pretty well set already.
Questions about the future mainly concern Moscon, as I just can't make a lot of sense of his season. I mean, he finished 8th in the individual standings two years ago - and now he's not even in the Top 20, riding mostly the same races. No clue... I'd love to switch his and Masnada's birthdates
Still, the individual standings obviously look great for us. Three in the Top 10 is amazing! Stüssi only just wins the title of best CT stage racer, but he does so despite some clear failures. Meaning he also had quite some great moments. Masnada is just a super cool rider to have - as said before, too bad he already turns 30. And Rekita entering the Top 10 as well clearly justifies his signing the year before.
Aregger adds a 15th place on top of that in his final maxed season - he'll be really hard to replace given his versatility. Moscon has already been mentioned - future unclear - whereas Marchewka in 27th definitely was a good signing as well. Even Mäder just made the Top 30 - although we mostly have to consider it a failed experiment to use him as a leader (which only went well in California where he scored almost half of his points).
So that's 3 in the Top 10, 4 more in the Top 30, and 2 more in the Top 100 (making a total of 9). 8 riders scored more than 100 points, which probably is the main reason why we end up so far ahead.
But enough talking about Jura, let's talk about the other teams now. First of all, congrats to McCormick and Glanbia for sticking to your project, which was finally rewarded with promotion this year I hope you'll find a way of making the necessary moves for being competitive in PCT as well
Congrats as well to Colombini, who had the right intuition with Saber and were rewarded for going all-in. Looking forward to see how you continue your project with Saber declining now.
And congrats as well to Tryg for your late-season jump, after a huge ToA! As UU mentioned before, it's four teams of the 2019 class promoting this year, although lief and I already gained some (bad) experience in PCT before.
I admit I'm a little disappointed that both BWT and BNZ finally missed out on direct promotion. Both ivan and Jakstar were really active throughout the season, and I'd have loved to see them go up. But alas... I'm pretty confident that both will finally still promote - although I'm never hoping for disbands, at least two managers said it'd be their last year, and quite some managers never showed up during the season unfortunately.
Caja also did a good job to finish as the 2nd best new team, even though some of the more experienced ones moved past them in the end. Tafjord had quite some bad luck - especially with Hagen not at all performing according to his skills - and I really wish them more luck for next year, where they'll hopefully promote!
And kudos to sgdanny for taking a Top 10 in his (second) first season, this time with Oktal.
Bianchi looked great for quite a while, but with less cobbles in the second half of the year, they also started dropping. Unlucky to slip out of the Top 10, though.
Pas Normal surprisingly had a clearly worse year than in their inaugural season, where they finished 6th - guess there's a major rebuild incoming.
Then we have a big batch of new teams - who all did a decent job in their first season as well, clearly not taking the Colombini approach to go for instant success, though. I hope your longer-term projects will come to fruition eventually
That said, I'm also looking forward to how TMM's Caribbean project shapes up. He's talking about promoting, or even winning the division next year - I'm honestly not aware of all riders currently out on loan, but I surely expect them to be competitive next year!
And Eddie Stobart... is just Eddie Stobart. Honestly, I don't know how MG can be fun without participating at all, not even in transfers. But this probably feels right for sutty, so I'm fine with it as well.
I'd like to echo all the others thanking the reporters and other background workers as well - you guys are doing a great job, even if some of it is rarely ever visible! Without the community, this game would long be dead, so let's work together to keep it alive for years to come
. Boswell did all we could ask particularly given he never had a single quality domestique. 
![imgur.com/KlJUqDx.jpg[/img[img]]https://imgur.com/yUygrQ.jpg](https://imgur.com/KlJUqDx.jpg[/img[img]]https://imgur.com/yUygrQ.jpg)
