Sucks to see such an ending to this race, especially for Yates and Bennett who both should've done so much better. Stage 3 already had some stupid splits, and now it happens again. OK, with wind and a twisty route it isn't unexpected to see splits - and I don't mind that much if it happens twice or three times a year - but I feel like we don't need to introduce extra chances for the AI to create gaps on flat stages, it's already done often enough... Not meant as a criticism for route makers, they couldn't test everything before.
My "sad" feeling obviously doesn't concern my team, which I'm very happy with in this race. It's all about the way the race played out. But I can't change it, so I'll still lose a few words about my riders.
Stüssi and Darbellay both finishing inside the GC Top 10 is awesome, no doubt. I think Stüssi should've ended up 9th or 10th with an acceptable AI, so while 6th obviously is on the upper end of expectations (at least with the MTT being for climbers this time, which I didn't anticipate either), it doesn't feel wrong. Darbellay should've ended up between 15th and 20th most likely, and this overperformance makes him my 10th rider above 200 points...
Schmid threw away some GC spots and a potential U25 Top 3, but I don't care - he brings home the KoM jersey, which should be his first one. I was waiting for such a move all year long - he does it in the penultimate stage race of the year. Great job!
Dylan Page was solid on stage 2, and failed today - but it didn't matter anyway with the break staying away... Hugo Page was great to follow with his breakaway attempts, getting the KoM lead for one day and a couple of points in the end.
Last but not least, the team finished 2nd in the team standings, netting three more points for another neo-pro with Davies. All in all, a great race for us, and I guess we should be in the Top 3 scoring teams once again thanks to great depth (or rather: very, very kind AI treatment...)
Congrats to Glanbia on another Eastman GC win - I guess he won all of his stage races this year. But as someone said: winning ToA and still relegating? Could well happen.
And I think the lack of points by the other riders could indeed mean Glanbia didn't quite score enough to close the gap to safety, leaving them in need of a couple of overperformances...
When speaking of the relegation fight - while it wasn't a great race for Colombini, it wasn't one for Zwift, either. The latter could've gained so many more points with Jorgenson that they eventually ended up with, really tough luck. So I do think they're really at risk now, with Colombini having far more races left...
In the promotion fight, the last stage obviously was really bad news for Indosat, and the whole race wasn't great for Xero. Except for day one, of course. On the other hand, Fastned scored big, and Bralirwa were solid. Bad news for Assa I guess, but with Gesbert they could well have the edge over the two others without a top puncheur.
Lierse did an OK job as well, and Sony should have closed in on the promotion spots, too - if Benoot can do some Emilia-like magic in his final races, Sony could ending up being a serious contender as well! And Xero have three Areruya races plus Euskal (for Houle?) left, still hard to see them missing out on promotion. But I'm expecting a pretty close race after these Japan results...
Last but not least, thanks a lot to kb for the reports! And I know that awful feeling after reporting such a weird stage; one of my reasons (besides the main reason that are the kids) for not doing reports currently...
Eden95 wrote:
You’re absolutely fucking kidding me. Fuck this game version right off.
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
While Kuss managed to not only come nowhere close to the top 35 but was not even our highest finisher., he was beaten by the unmaxed Quinn So that race continues the McCormick sleepwalk through the second half of the year.
We will switch out that stage, the AI doesn't handle short flat stages great generally and then when you add all the turns in that stage it becomes worse. We try and avoid that in stage design but didn't notice this one until long after the calendar was in place.
There are still quite a few splits on flat stages even when you don't have all the turns. Not sure there is much to do about that, could try increasing the time gaps but that is tedious to do on any scale.
Glad that Choi survived that one but the others in the team didn't, so while the race overall was pretty good for us, we did lose 10-15 points on that final stage with the split for the GC and the Teams standings. Well, could be worse. We aren't exactly the luckiest team out there, and if anything, we didn't get lucky here, just were rock solid from the start, and got the desired outcome. Some teams who lost out here have had more than their fair share of good fortune through the season by virtue of PCM 22 AI.
Congrats to Glanbia, love to see them keep fighting till the end. And thanks for the reports kb
We win some, we lose some. Excellent racing in the breakaway from Kaloniatis and Hoelgaard marred by massive time losses by Schlegel. At least we had something to soften the blow, commiserations to those that didn't. Thanks for the reports as well!
Two fourth places for Arashiro are a bit sour, but having him top 5 as our home rider is still a big win in my books! Glad the breakaways got some chances. Congrats to Glanbia for the good ride!
