It's 11 races in April for the PCT teams, so we'll split them once again. For once, let's do the split between C1/C2 and PTHC/HC races:
Partial April Ranking | C1/C2
First up was the Tour du Faso, the yearly C2 cobbles carnage. Three PCT teams decided to send their riders to the African torture - and two of them actually were pretty successful. Most of all Bralirwa, who took 7th on stage 1 and 6th on stage 3 with Teggart - resulting in a very strong 5th place GC finish. Okbamariam (GC) and Habimana (U25) also scored - 46 points for the Rwandans.
Schäppi finished 7th in the GC for UBS, and together with Grand's 14th place, that's 33 points for the Swiss cobble specialists. DuckDuckGo on the other hand had to settle for a 17th place by Vahtra and 5 points.
The Baltic Chain Tour was a far higher scoring race for the PCT teams, being C1 rated - and hence with far more participants. It was a gigantic Dainese show, with two stage wins, one 2nd place and a 4th place in the four sprint stages. GC win, points jersey and U25 win came on top of that, resulting in an insane 217 points for the Italian alone, which is huge for C1! Assa Abloy also got 15 depth points on top of that, resulting in a total of 232 points.
Which obviously is miles above the rest, with Fastned getting just a bit more than half of it - 128 points for the Dutchmen. Groenewegen got two 2nd places - twice behind Dainese, of course - as well as 2nd in GC and points. By the way, nobody else scored for the team.
For 3rd place, we have to go another 40 points down, to arrive at Kraftwerk. Haller's 3rd place on the final stage - after three straight 5th places before - was just enough to net him 3rd in GC and points as well. 88 points for the Austrian - and for the entire team.
Before the final stage race in this category, we have three classics. The C2 Berlin Pro Race came first, attracting just 3 PCT teams, just like Faso. And Lierse, Assa Abloy and Los Pollos scored a grand total of 6 points, with the former getting 4 points with Biermans and Mareczko, and the two latter one point each from Veyhe and Quispe.
Over to China then, with the C1 Badaling International. Looking at the profile, a puncheur with strong climbing skills should be the favourite on such a course - so to see Meurisse winning was rather unexpected to be honest. With Turgis finishing 16th, and - even far more surprising than the winner - Dzamastagic getting 19th, that's 91 points for Lampre. Bagioli finished 2nd, and with Narvaez and Boswell also in the points, McCormick scored 61 points in total. 3rd place goes to 3rd place finisher Vansevenant and Fastned, who got an additional point by Cras to make it 47.
There's really not much to say about C2 Lincoln GP - except that Jura made a fool of themselves by scoring zero points in a field of just 13 teams. No points for the sole PCT participants.
And yet another C2 race - the 4-day USA Pro Cycling Challenge - rounds off April racing in the lower categories. Only Spark-BNZ decided to make the trip to the States, joining local team Zwift for the race.
It was a pretty worthwile race for the latter, not so much for the former. Walls finished 2nd on stage 2, later finishing 5th in the GC and taking the U25 jersey. 54 points for the young sprinter and Zwift. Spark had to settle for 6 points by Scott, who most notably took 4th place on stage 1 and the U25 for one day.
Overall, we have two relatively high-scoring teams in this block, with Assa Abloy being the best team. Dainese's Baltic show plus one point from Berlin result in 233 points. Fastned in 2nd place also have Baltic plus a classic - it's Badaling for them, which went rather well, too. 175 points for the Dutchmen - and that's it about the teams scoring 100 points and more.
However, Colombini almost got there, too, scoring 99 points from Baltic and Badaling. Lampre only did the latter, which was a great one with 91 points; alongside Kraftwerk - 88 points from Baltic - they're pretty close to the podium.
Given the mass of C2 races, most teams here only competed in one race, some also in two - and then we have Los Pollos who did three. The only team to not race at all were Tryg, who are joined at the bottom by Jura who failed to score in their only race. Xero, Spark and Genii weren't much better, though, all below 10 points.
Team
Faso
Bal
Ber
Bad
Lin
PCC
Total
1
Assa Abloy
0
232
1
0
0
0
233
2
Fastned
0
128
0
47
0
0
175
3
Colombini Cycling
0
71
0
28
0
0
99
4
Lampre - Pinarello
0
0
0
91
0
0
91
5
Kraftwerk Man Machine
0
88
0
0
0
0
88
6
Sauber Petronas Racing
0
74
0
0
0
0
74
7
DK Žalgiris
0
72
0
0
0
0
72
8
McCormick Pro Cycling
0
0
0
61
0
0
61
9
Zwift Pro Cycling
0
0
0
0
0
54
54
10
Bralirwa - Stevens Bikes
46
0
0
0
0
0
46
11
DuckDuckGo - Everesting
5
0
0
40
0
0
45
12
Los Pollos Hermanos
0
2
1
41
0
0
44
13
Indosat Ooredoo
0
42
0
0
0
0
42
14
Team UBS - Tissot
33
0
0
0
0
0
33
15
Sony - Force India
0
8
0
20
0
0
28
16
Team Popo4Ever p/b Morshynska
0
15
0
11
0
0
26
17
Lierse SK - Pizza Ullo PCTeam
0
0
4
11
0
0
15
18
Trans Looney Tunes
0
0
0
15
0
0
15
19
Glanbia
0
12
0
0
0
0
12
20
Genii Hyundai N Cycling
0
0
0
8
0
0
8
21
Spark-BNZ Racing
0
0
0
0
0
6
6
22
Xero Racing
0
0
0
1
0
0
1
23
Jura GIANTS
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
24
Tryg - Gobyk
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
Partial April Ranking | PTHC/HC
Over to the higher category races then. The first of these was the sole stage race of the block - the HC-rated Tour de Pologne. And if Baltic was a Dainese show, then this one was Areruya's masterclass! In a race with three hilltop finishes, he got three stage wins, the GC win, and the points jersey. 288 points for Areruya, plus some minor points by Kipkemboi and Van Zyl - 299 points for Xero! Which by the way is the current PCT record for 2023, one point higher than Los Pollos in Juarez, and two higher than McCormick in South Africa.
So, what's left for the others then? Well, quite a lot, actually, with two more teams getting above 200 points. Mentjes took 2nd place twice behind Areruya, also ending up 2nd in the GC. Eyob and Ndayisenga also scored some decent points - it's 211 for the Rwandans in total (thereof 180 by their South African star rider).
Daan Olivier took a 2nd, 3rd and 4th place each in the three hilltop finish stages, ending up 3rd in the GC. But with Cras in 14th and Vanhoucke in 20th, Fastned scored almost as many points as Bralirwa - 209 to be precise.
One thing to note is that whereas in earlier editions pure puncheurs used to compete for higher placings as well, this has now clearly become a climber's race, with all the strong climbers taking the GC top spots.
Four classics left in this block, with PTHC Roma Maxima being the only cobbled one. In a tough race, Stallaert was the strongest PCT rider in 5th place. Teggart and Okbamariam added a Top 50 result each, so that's 84 points for the Rwandans. Edward Theuns for once had to settle for a spot behind Stallaert, taking 7th place and 60 points for Jura. Summerhill was 9th in one of the year's better races, adding 40 points to Tryg's points tally.
GP Wallonie was again HC rated, so no PT teams present to take the big points from PCT's top puncheurs. But a punchy sprinter, as Ackermann won the race and earned 140 points for Zwift! Stannard's 2nd place also was a tad surprising, but that's some well deserved 98 points for him and DuckDuckGo after a great ride. Areruya for once had to settle for 3rd place and 82 points - at least Tesfaye Heyi added 5 more for Xero, 87 points for the Kiwis.
And then, the big sprint clash. Veenendaal is PTHC, so let's put it first. But in terms of scoring, it wasn't the best race for PCT. A bit surprisingly, Silvestre was the highest PCT finisher in 9th place, netting Bralirwa another 40 points, plus 2 by Verona. Manninen had to settle for 11th, just 32 points for Los Pollos. Walscheid in 13th was the next PCT sprinter, with Naud and Quinn adding some depth to get 29 points for McCormick.
It's a really, really close fight for the top here! Despite not racing in both PTHC classics, Xero take the top spot in this partial update, totalling 392 points. Bralirwa - racing everywhere except for Wallonie - follow just 2 points back, though!
Assa Abloy also had a great block, scoring 355 points despite a zero-pointer in Roma Maxima. And that's it for the teams above 300 points.
Fastned almost got there as well, though, despite skipping three out of four classics! It's 291 points for them, with Indosat rounding off the Top 5 with 275 points.
Lampre, Jura and DuckDuckGo scored above 200 points as well, with the big midfield - ranging from Tryg in 9th to McCormick in 18th - all between 115 and 187 points.
At the bottom, Glanbia failed to score in their only race, Wallonie. Kraftwerk and Lierse didn't do much better - Spark won't be overly happy with 41 points out of all 5 races either, though.
Team
Pol
Roma
Wal
V-V
Lis
Total
1
Xero Racing
299
0
87
0
6
392
2
Bralirwa - Stevens Bikes
211
84
0
42
53
390
3
Assa Abloy
153
0
31
15
156
355
4
Fastned
209
0
0
0
82
291
5
Indosat Ooredoo
152
2
70
13
38
275
6
Lampre - Pinarello
135
0
69
0
34
238
7
Jura GIANTS
87
60
60
12
18
237
8
DuckDuckGo - Everesting
92
0
98
0
31
221
9
Tryg - Gobyk
39
40
0
5
103
187
10
Team UBS - Tissot
116
0
45
0
12
173
11
Genii Hyundai N Cycling
155
4
0
9
0
168
12
DK Žalgiris
137
0
5
0
22
164
13
Los Pollos Hermanos
88
30
0
32
5
155
14
Sony - Force India
54
0
31
0
70
155
15
Zwift Pro Cycling
0
8
140
2
0
150
16
Trans Looney Tunes
56
0
69
0
10
135
17
Colombini Cycling
35
0
22
0
61
118
18
McCormick Pro Cycling
49
0
32
29
5
115
19
Team Popo4Ever p/b Morshynska
59
0
0
0
20
79
20
Sauber Petronas Racing
45
0
5
0
9
59
21
Spark-BNZ Racing
5
0
18
11
7
41
22
Lierse SK - Pizza Ullo PCTeam
0
0
15
0
0
15
23
Kraftwerk Man Machine
0
0
5
0
0
5
24
Glanbia
0
0
0
0
0
0
Period Ranking | April
1st in C1/C2, 3rd in PTHC/HC - there's not much doubt about the winners of the month, it's obviously Assa Abloy! Sure, they did have the (shared) highest amount of race days this month with 22, but with 588 points scored they also have the 3rd best PpRD return - despite a zero-pointer! It obviously was a very Dainese-friendly month - but it'd be unfair to omit strong contributors like Faglum Karlsson or Gesbert. Great job!
Fastned also had a very strong month, with the second highest PpRD and 2nd place overall. 466 points are quite a lot behind Assa Abloy, but also 6 days less of racing. Bralirwa actually came pretty close, having a really strong month as well with 436 points in just 18 RDs!
Xero "only" manage to take 4th place this month - but they only needed 13 RDs to score 393 points, and they're the only team with a PpRD of 30+! This should be pretty good signs for the overall standings - we'll see those in a moment.
Lampre also used just 13 race days, to get 70 points less, though - but the five teams with the highest PpRD are still in the Top 5 spots this month. Indosat came pretty close with 317 points, but they spent 20 days to get there.
It's then a 50 points gap down to DuckDuckGo, who in turn are 30 points clear of Jura and Zalgiris. Colombini, another 20 points back, round off the Top 10.
UBS and Zwift are the final teams above 200 points - the latter actually were the 6th most efficient team considering PpRD - which is pretty amazing, given that 4 out of their 10 RDs were in C2!
Los Pollos must have pretty opposite feelings - 22 race days spent, but only 199 points and a PpRD of less than 10 - is the division title gone now? Well, that would be a premature conclusion for sure...
Tryg and Sony also make the Top 15, but especially for the latter - being one of the often-mentioned promotion contenders - this must be another disappointing result.
Genii and McCormick are ex-aequo in 16th place, with Trans, Sauber and Popo4Ever taking the final Top 20 spots, all above 100 points.
At the bottom, Glanbia, Lierse and Spark had an awful month. And whereas Kraftwerk's 93 points don't look great, either, their PpRD actually has them in 12th place, so it's not as awful as it looks like. P4E and Sauber should be far more worried in that respect...
Team
C1/C2
PTHC/HC
Total
RD
PpRD
1
Assa Abloy
233
355
588
22
26.73
2
Fastned
175
291
466
16
29.13
3
Bralirwa - Stevens Bikes
46
390
436
18
24.22
4
Xero Racing
1
392
393
13
30.23
5
Lampre - Pinarello
91
238
329
13
25.31
6
Indosat Ooredoo
42
275
317
20
15.85
7
DuckDuckGo - Everesting
45
221
266
16
16.63
8
Jura GIANTS
0
237
237
17
13.94
9
DK Žalgiris
72
164
236
16
14.75
10
Colombini Cycling
99
118
217
18
12.06
11
Team UBS - Tissot
33
173
206
16
12.88
12
Zwift Pro Cycling
54
150
204
10
20.40
13
Los Pollos Hermanos
44
155
199
22
9.05
14
Tryg - Gobyk
0
187
187
13
14.38
15
Sony - Force India
28
155
183
18
10.17
16
Genii Hyundai N Cycling
8
168
176
17
10.35
17
McCormick Pro Cycling
61
115
176
17
10.35
18
Trans Looney Tunes
15
135
150
13
11.54
19
Sauber Petronas Racing
74
59
133
18
7.39
20
Team Popo4Ever p/b Morshynska
26
79
105
18
5.83
21
Kraftwerk Man Machine
88
5
93
7
13.29
22
Spark-BNZ Racing
6
41
47
19
2.47
23
Lierse SK - Pizza Ullo PCTeam
15
15
30
6
5.00
24
Glanbia
12
0
12
7
1.71
Full Ranking
Last month, we talked about the Top 5 having a decent margin on the rest already. Well, that's still true - even more than before - but there has still be quite some movement, with one team joining the Top 5 and all the others moving around as well.
Which obviously means that the previous leaders are no longer at the top - instead, Fastned have taken that spot. Their manager already expressed some serious concern about their promotion challenge after a couple of mediocre races - well, they're leading the division now with 1,540 points and are well on-track.
After a "midtable" month, Jura have lost their lead - but they're still sitting in 2nd, with the 3rd highest PpRD. It's 1,493 points for the Swiss, roughly 50 points off the lead now. The podium is completed - another 50 points further down - by Bralirwa, who had an unexpectedly strong finish in the sprinter classics - and who now have the division's 2nd highest PpRD. Looks like Meintjes, Stallaert and Izagirre could indeed promote them this year!
It was definitely the other way round for Los Pollos this month, with the Mexicans dropping from 2nd to 4th after a month to forget. It's 1,364 points for them, roughly 70 behind the podium. But they're still easily on track for bouncing back - even more so given that "Zmorka time" is yet to start.
And in 5th place - only 11 points behind LPH - are the biggest winners of the month, Assa Abloy. Already with a promising PpRD last month, they confirmed their great scoring potential to move up from 8th to 5th now, with 1,353 points - and the top PpRD of the entire division by now!
I said it before - despite some movement, the gap between 5th and the rest has massively increased this month. Lampre - another team doing well in April - have jumped up from 9th to 6th - with a total score of 1,080. So that's a deficit of 273 points already. But well, some teams have scored this amount in a single race, so the gap still is far from being decisive.
Popo4Ever are the previous Top 5 team that no longer is up there, having dropped down to 7th. With 1,046 points, they're the last team above 1,000 points, trailing Lampre by just 34 points.
This also means that all other teams are more than 350 points behind the promotion spots already, but don't be fooled: Indosat in 8th (from 12th last month) have the 6th best PpRD, and both Yates and especially Dunbar have barely raced so far. Don't write them off by any means!
Sony then round off the Top 10 with 923 points - promotion currently is 430 points away, and a big portion of that should have been covered by Benoot. Maybe Choi can fill the gap?
900 points aren't enough for the current Top 10, given that we have DuckDuckGo and Xero in 11th and 12th with 901 and 900 points respectively. Both have gained 5 spots this month - and Xero actually have the 7th best PpRD now that Areruya has been unleashed for good. We'll see where him, Bennett and Pidcock can lead the team...
UBS are only 36 points behind - but with 15 RDs more than Xero, which actually is a rather worrying situation for the Swiss considering their PpRD. McCormick right behind them - 9 points to be precise - also have 15 RDs more to spend, which projects them an upper-midtable finish; actually even a Top 10.
The same isn't true for one of the often-named promotion candidates, Lierse, who are only just inside the Top 15. And really only just, as their 799 points are just one more than Sauber in 16th. But the Sammarinese, having raced a bit more, only have the 7th lowest PpRD of the division and might be slightly worried about relegation by now.
Kraftwerk are another spot down - but with 48 RDs, they've raced far less than those right ahead of them, e.g. 19 days less than Sauber. Yep, that's PCT. Zalgiris also are above 700 points, in 18th place, but with some good chances of jumping inside the Top 15 once they catch up with their RDs as well.
So, just 6 teams left - with Colombini currently sitting in the last safe spot, having moved up one place. They're projected to finish 18th, so there's still quite some work to do - even more so considering that the first relegation spot is just 30 points away.
And that one currently belongs to Genii. 30 points might sound like some good news to them - the bad news is that they're the team with the most RDs spent so far, which results in the 3rd lowest PpRD. Nothing lost yet, but it won't get easier.
The same can be said about Trans, who are already more than 100 points behind safety, and quite some hilly races in the books already. Zwift are in a slightly different situation; although their 490 points scored so far aren't great, they're the team with the lowest amount of RDs spent - and team leader Powless still has to start his season! Norway would look like a good option to do so...
And so we're left with the two worst teams, both in terms of scoring and considering PpRD. Spark are the worst in the latter scale, Glanbia have the red lantern in terms of actual scoring. Both were predicted to have a rough season - both indeed are having one. But both should also have the right leaders to turn things around with one or two great races, so they still shouldn't lose hope yet.
In short, we currently have a pretty sizeable gap between the Top 5 and the rest - the Top 5 being the only teams with PpRDs above 21, Indosat being best of the rest with 17. But we're only 1/3 through the seasons - some teams even less - so plenty of things are still going to happen!
Looking at the individual standings, you'd say that PCT only consists of sprinters, with three of them topping the list. And indeed, with Juarez, Guadeloupe, Baltic Chain and partly TDU, most stage races for the sprinters are done - it's basically just Ras Tailteann left for them.
Joeri Stallaert stays in 6th place, getting quite a lot closer to Theuns, though. With Franceville as a bonus race compared to Theuns, Stallaert should defend his crown as the division's top cobbler - he's currently 90 points behind.
Matti Manninen actually shares 6th place with Stallaert, totalling 421 points as well - of the Top 7 riders of the division, only Areruya currently has a sprint stat of below 77...
Rounding off the current Top 10 are Robert Stannard - who gained 3 spots - Sergio Higuita, dropping one place, and Louis Meintjes, jumping up from 18th to 10th. They are ranging from 398 to 367 points.
Dropping out of the Top 10 are Aniolkowski (14th), Izagirre (18th) and Dunbar (20th) - although at least the latter will likely bounce back by the end of the month...
Besides Areruya - jumping from 37th to 5th - notable improvers include Meurisse (36th -> 11th), Ackermann (33rd -> 15th) or Olivier (50th -> 19th).
With May being a relatively TT-heavy month for stage races, including TTTs in Romandie, Lithuania and Olympia's Tour, plus an ITT in Norway, Austria and again Olympia's Tour, we can expect some TTers and stage racers with decent TT to make their way up - although the cobblers also have their fair share with Cheshire and Dunkerque. We'll soon find out!
The last 3 seasons have taught me to take any and all rankings updates with a grain of salt, but this is the most promising update we’ve had in 3 seasons it’s nice to not open these threads full of existential dread! It’s crazy how far the top-5 have already pulled away from the rest.
I’m surprised we are where we are considering Dunbar and Yates have barely raced. There’s plenty of good teams behind us and I expect a lot of them to overtake us before the end of the season, but it’s nice to not have to worry about every single point the team can scrape out if a race for once
Good to see Areruya go from nothing to top-10 after a couple of races, as well as Stannard proving that he’s worth his wage.
Thanks for the great update, since I think 17th was the consensus projection for us a month in 17th seems ok. Wasn't necessarily a month we expected a lot from, Wallonia probably the big disappointment.
Despite the issues with sprinters the top sprinters sitting in 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 7th and 13th. I am guessing the schedule has favored them so far which is why they are all near the top collectively but at least it is pretty much the right guys.
Still lots of the season to go, nothing decided at this point for anyone I think.
Thank you for the great, comprehensive update Fabianski!
A great month for us, where Dainese bounced back and really displayed his full potential Hopefully he can keep this up for the rest of the season, where classics makes up the majority of his schedule. Great performance from Faglum Karlsson in Pologne as well, whereas Gesbert continues to struggle.
Overall, we’re slightly ahead of our pre-season expectations at this point. We’re now on a bit of break with only Tour of Norway remaining in May, before we have a busy schedule in June that admittedly doesn’t suit the team that well. Expect the PpRD to drop a bit before we get to July and August which are key months for us.
I'm surprised we retained our 10th spot given how bad the month seemed to go! Vesely stepping up in the end helped but we need at least three among him, Ringheim, Choi and Benoot inside the Top 30 come the end of the season to have any chance of promotion. Top 5 already getting away though, so lots of work needs to be done.
Really strong month for us. It's kind of wild how last year was supposed to be the all-in attempt to promote and we weren't even close, and this year was supposed to be the start of a rebuild and we're looking better than we ever have. We're benefiting from some overperformances, no doubt, but also we finally have some depth scoring. Sure, we still have our 3 leaders in the Top 20 (although I'm almost certain that Izagirre won't stay there), but we currently have 4 more riders in the Top 100, compared to 0 in the final rankings update of last season.
We've always started the season strong thanks to Stallaert and then faded as he had few valuable race days later on, but this year, it looks more sustainable. Joeri still has 5 cobbles races left (even if some of them don't suit him as much), including two promising PTHC races. Meintjes will ride no less than 5 more stage races, he should do at least reasonably well in all of them.
I don't put too much stock in the gap to 6th yet, Assa Abloy has shown this month how one big month can impact a team's outlook. I expect Xero and Indosat to make big jumps over the next couple of months and I don't see any obvious candidate among the other Top 5 teams to take a big step backwards. But given that I entered transfer season worried about putting together a squad that's even just capable of surviving in PCT, this has season has exceeded all expectations already, no matter what happens the rest of the way.
Looking at the bottom of the rankings, it's going to be interesting if Genii, Glanbia, Spark or Trans have enough firepower left to have a realistic shot at avoiding relegation. If I'm not mistaken, Penasa and Eastman haven't participated much yet, so maybe they can give their teams a big enough boost. Not quite sure what to make of Zwift. Their PpRD look alright, but that includes what felt like an outlier performance by Ackermann. They'll need more of those, I reckon. The other question of course is, which of the teams currently above the line could be overtaken. Sauber I think might be most endangered, and then I'm not 100% sure about Kraftwerk or Colombini. Zalgiris should be fine I think, although that might depend on how many race days Halvorsen has left.
Anyway, some very interesting storylines to follow over the next few months. As always, thanks a lot Fab for the in depth look at the races, a pleasure to read!
Thank you for the update Fabi!
Really difficult for us to be upset about our racing this month which has increased our PpRD but even then I have a hard time seeing us compete for the promotion spots as Meurisse and Turgis arent racing for a little while and have very few RDs left in general, leaving our fate in the hands of Monsalve and our sprint core!
cunego59 wrote:
Really strong month for us. It's kind of wild how last year was supposed to be the all-in attempt to promote and we weren't even close, and this year was supposed to be the start of a rebuild and we're looking better than we ever have. We're benefiting from some overperformances, no doubt, but also we finally have some depth scoring. Sure, we still have our 3 leaders in the Top 20 (although I'm almost certain that Izagirre won't stay there), but we currently have 4 more riders in the Top 100, compared to 0 in the final rankings update of last season.
We've always started the season strong thanks to Stallaert and then faded as he had few valuable race days later on, but this year, it looks more sustainable. Joeri still has 5 cobbles races left (even if some of them don't suit him as much), including two promising PTHC races. Meintjes will ride no less than 5 more stage races, he should do at least reasonably well in all of them.
I don't put too much stock in the gap to 6th yet, Assa Abloy has shown this month how one big month can impact a team's outlook. I expect Xero and Indosat to make big jumps over the next couple of months and I don't see any obvious candidate among the other Top 5 teams to take a big step backwards. But given that I entered transfer season worried about putting together a squad that's even just capable of surviving in PCT, this has season has exceeded all expectations already, no matter what happens the rest of the way.
Looking at the bottom of the rankings, it's going to be interesting if Genii, Glanbia, Spark or Trans have enough firepower left to have a realistic shot at avoiding relegation. If I'm not mistaken, Penasa and Eastman haven't participated much yet, so maybe they can give their teams a big enough boost. Not quite sure what to make of Zwift. Their PpRD look alright, but that includes what felt like an outlier performance by Ackermann. They'll need more of those, I reckon. The other question of course is, which of the teams currently above the line could be overtaken. Sauber I think might be most endangered, and then I'm not 100% sure about Kraftwerk or Colombini. Zalgiris should be fine I think, although that might depend on how many race days Halvorsen has left.
Anyway, some very interesting storylines to follow over the next few months. As always, thanks a lot Fab for the in depth look at the races, a pleasure to read!
I wanna stay positive but after a few races I think Trans is going slowly towards CT.
Starting to really climb now but that gap to the top 5 is just huge. Particularly as they were 5 teams expected to be high quality and can't put it all down to overperformances. Not seen any signs of overperformance from my team yet so although it's far from over I'm still not feeling great. Would love to be proven wrong of course!
Absolutely love to see my guys Higuita, Stannard and Meurisse joining Areruya in the top places of the climbers and puncheurs. All three proving themselves absolute bargains
Spoiler
Obviously Kelderman is just winding up to show how much better than Stannard he is in the next few months
24/02/21 - kandesbunzler said “I don't drink famous people."
15/08/22 - SotD said "Your [jandal's] humour is overrated"
11/06/24 - knockout said "Winning is fine I guess. Truth be told this felt completely unimportant." [ICL] Santos-Euskadi | [PT] Xero Racing
For us, it was a pretty mediocre month. Not a truly bad one, though - on one hand, the rather low scoring was expected given the races we had; on the other hand, the scoring was close to "decent", and Theuns could even have made it a "good" one by winning Roma Maxima. That didn't happen, and so the overall scoring isn't "good".
But we only dropped one spot, behind Fastned who had a really good month, so I definitely can't complain about the ranking situation. We can't have 10 months like March, and being close to the month's Top 10 in terms of PpRD is not shabby by any means. But although I have to admit that the gap to 6th looks pretty nice, it's far too early to draw any conclusions. Sure, we're on track for 3,000 points, which would be awesome - but the points we already have include a great contribution by Theuns, which unfortunately will be much smaller in the remaining part of the season. On the other hand, teams like Indosat (with Dunbar and Yates) or Xero (with Areruya and Bennett) will surely pick up the pace and should be in the promotion race this year.
But, as a newly promoted team, who am I to talk about promotion anyway... A Top 10 still has to be our goal, and that one definitely doesn't look too bad. We'll have to keep up our decent scoring to reach it, though - which also means that we should do better in May than we did in April. We've got the same number of RDs, but I'm hoping to get at least 100 points more. It's the month that really marks the start of Stüssi's season - and although he did a good job at the Giro, I'm still wondering how well he can do against PCT competition. Romandie and Norway should give some good indications...
Generally speaking, Fastned, Los Pollos and Assa should definitely go up. Bralirwa should have some good races left for Stallaert and Meintjes - but it might come down to the question whether Izagirre can keep up his amazing early-season form. I think that Indosat could close the gap and join the Top 5 later in the year - and Xero might do the same, if Areruya continues to dominate, and Bennett doesn't repeat the rather poor Colombia performance. So that's already 6 teams for 5 promotion spots - and I seriously have no clue where we will end up. Maybe behind all of these, maybe right in the middle - or maybe we'll drop down a lot if performances are far worse than expected. But as long as we don't relegate - and we honestly shouldn't - I can live with a lot of outcomes.
Thanks for the great overview here. Just catching up on the MG after a few months away due to a IRL job change and life in general being crazy recently.
Great to see Ackermann win GP Wallonie and get us much needed points! Now need the rest of our team to step up and do something otherwise this season is going to end like last season: relegation.
it’s nice to not open these threads full of existential dread! It’s crazy how far the top-5 have already pulled away from the rest.
