There has been only one race since the last update, but it’s been the final one of the season and thus the decider for all the questions still open.
With Herklotz winning it’s no surprise Puma also came away with the most points. Aker – MOT and Xero made up the podium both in the race and in scoring. The latter had to gain some points to jump Fastned for the overall top 10 and they gained some, but just some, as the Dutch came in 4th in Lombardia. Will it still be enough for the Kiwis?
Lombardia Ranking
Pos
Team
Giro di Lombardia
1
Team Puma - SAP
331
2
Aker - MOT
245
3
Xero Racing
219
4
Fastned
196
5
Gazelle
181
6
Polar
166
7
Tinkoff Team - La Datcha
153
8
Cedevita
131
9
EA Vesuvio
117
10
ELCO - ABEA
114
11
Indosat Ooredoo
110
12
Jura GIANTS
101
13
Rabobank
101
14
Carlsberg - Danske Bank
94
15
King Power
89
16
Evonik - ELKO
87
17
Grieg-Maersk
75
18
Los Pollos Hermanos
68
19
Lierse SK - Pizza Ullo Pro Cycling
60
20
Sony - Force India
45
21
cycleYorkshire
40
22
Team UBS
40
Overall Ranking
With only one race since the last update we will leave everything that wasn’t really at stake for the respective managers to explore for themselves and concentrate on the more important questions in the grand scheme of things.
First of all the top of the rankings: MAL didn’t have a good day and probably gave his manager some unnecessarily hard time. But in the end all of the top 5 scored within 24 points, so the big pre-season favourite made it to the line. Big congratulations to Evonik – ELKO for winning the PT title this season!
EA Vesuvio ends its existence with a 2nd place. Rabobank takes the final podium spot after a really strong season.
There also haven’t been any changes in 4th to 7th, but then Puma jumped Indosat Ooredoo for 8th as has been expected.
It was really close between Xero and Fastned in many races this season, they also were only 14 points apart before the final race and came close there as well. But in the end the Kiwis had the better end by 4 points and managed to finish in the last top 10 spot.
Behind those two Valters great Lombardia brought Aker – MOT back to 12th because cycleYorkshire only scored participation points.
So now to the last big question left: who will be the fifth team going down? Los Pollos Hermanos went into the season finale in the best position, but also they failed to defend 16th they are bound for another year on the highest level. In the end a surprising 5th from Aleotti saved the not-reigning-champions-anymore Gazelle who actually also pipped the Mexicans. And that means Sony – Force India is going down after putting up a heroic fight all season.
Herklotz went into the final month as the overall leader and he countered a strong outing from Wirtgen in Praha by just winning Lombardia, putting himself back in the lead with well above 2000 points. And both of them will be available in Free Agency to fight for a new record contract. The final podium spot goes to Pedersen who might also become available, so transfers will probably be carnage.
The only other change in the top 10 is Vansevenant climbing to 10th.
Will be crazy when top 2 riders from PT enters Free Agency, what a season to promote to PT with a big wage budget!
Would also like to congratulate LPH and Gazelle with staying up on last day, hardbreak for Abhi and Sony. But looking at the bright side I look forward to racing against you!
Missing the top10 goal by 4 tiny points is tough. Guess we can count this as succeeded....
Congrats jandal. Couldn't have been much closer in Lombardia and here I guess. Now a hard time considering the off-season changes needed.
Phinney/Wellens not getting younger. Vansevenant alone with support of Hooydonck/Vesely won't be enough.
Unfortunate to see Sony going down. They surely will come back stronger but never nice to go the long way.
Also congrats knockout. Huge title win there. Good to see you did beat SN. Not that I hadn't liked it for him neither but better to see it going to an active manager really. Well deserved surely.
Congratulations to knockout on the well deserved win and congrats to Nemo and DD on staying clear in the relegation battle. For us a mixed bag this season. It was incredibly fun to have Kudus as a true top tier rider and taking our first ever GT win, but in the end I think his wage was our undoing. Probably could have found a few hundred points with an extra 200k of wage cap. So back to PCT we go, as is tradition
I think I'll just skip out on transfers this time. It's just a big waste of time for me and everyone else gets to find a better place to spent their money. Win-win?
Congrats to knockout on the long awaited title and to everyone who had a successful season. Commiserations to the relegated teams, especially our friends at Sony.
Thank you to everyone providing ranking updates through out the season.
Kind of a bummer announcement, but the scores for Lombardia are not correct! Will be updated soon...
Indeed, when I looked at the Lombardia scores, my first thought was "wait, did Puma get some penalty points?"
So I think we just made the 4,000 points... Still bad, and way below expectations of course. It was always going to be tough, but I didn't expect us to be so far away. I guess that's what you get when last year's Top 2 scorers get about 550 points less (combined), that's massive. Both Groves and Schmid weren't advantaged by the new version, that's for sure.
Otherwise, it's definitely a lack of quality as well - in particular Theuns' 700+ points missing really hurts. Add complete lack of results in hilly-TT stage races, and you quickly get those roughly 1,200 points that are missing.
So it's most likely going to be the continuation of our rebuild this offseason, and I guess our availability list won't be short (which is pretty much usual after a relegation I guess). With our current Swiss core, I do however think that PCT is the best suited division for us; it might take many more years to get a PT-ready team again. We'll see.
Huge congrats to knockout on the long awaited PT crown! Definitely a well-deserved win, even though it was closer than I (and many others) expected. Some changes (game version, RDC) didn't work out in your favour, but at least we had a cool fight (almost) until the end
For me, the biggest surprise is Rabobank, which I had as a relegation candidate (looks like I don't understand anything about MG, I know ^^) - but wow, what a season! Big congrats to alex as well!
Commiserations to the teams going down alongside us, but I'm sure they'll have good chances to bump back!
First of all, thank you to all who made this season possible. Year 12 of this project and it's still something I look forward to every day. It takes an incredible about of work, which I overwhelmingly consume rather the produce, and I'm beyond grateful for everyone's efforts.
5th place is a crazy result for us. After the top 10 last season, I really thought that we were bound to go down rather than up, maybe even dangerously so. Instead, we got even luckier this season. For my first 6 or 7 years in this game, I very rarely had any success. It was always just about scraping back, trying to avoid a relegation and have some fun with the RP. To be at this level is something I never dreamed of.
We did it because basically every rider on our team overperformed. That starts with David Per, like always. With Anderberg and Siric trained, I was very worried coming into this season. The cobbles field was more stacked than ever, and Per's high mountain, lower stamina build didn't seem as fitted to it. Here we are. Another top 10, over 1,000 points, podiums in almost every race he started, two (aggressive) sponsor goals fulfilled, and our very first monument victory in the Ronde. Still easily my boldest and best signing and training decision 3 years ago.
Last year, we got the huge boon from Carthy's amazing Giro which led to his 1,000 point season. We also still had Galta. My worry this season was that Carthy would regress and Skjelmose would be able to replace Galta. At least the former was true. Carthy was mundane this year but too strong for breakaways, and ended up kind of middling and anonymous in both his GTs. He scored less than half of last year, though he achieved our Vuelta top 10 goal, which is what mattered in the end.
On the flip side, Skjelmose was fantastic. Early on he disturbed me a bit by falling back with AKA and generally refusing to try in those hilly stage races with TTs that Wirtgen and Dunbar types love. But he thrived in GC races, most importantly with his Dauphine podium and TDF top 5/white/yellow jersey stint. Not to mention all the white jerseys. Almost 1,000 points is insane from him and obviously not replicable—he won't have U25 points anymore, and he can't count on a huge boon from a GT breakaway again. His wage demands are going to be tough to look at, though at least I have more confidence in training him again than I did 6 months ago.
Talking about guys I had previously no faith in, Aranburu had to be up there. With all the talk about stamina's increased impact, what could become of a puncheur with 70 stamina? It looked dire. So I did my best to plan him for routes that would suit him, and I guess I found them. The Vuelta style short stages with 3-8 km climbs at the end are basically perfect for him. His resistance plays up there. He's never gonna place in Lombardia or Liege, but he has a niche, and it was very rewarding to find it.
Sprinters: Rodenberg showed early that he has the talent with the Qatar result. He fell off a bit towards the end but still more than did his part. Going forward, I think as a high RES sprinter, he needs a leadout to get him to the front early, as that was when he was most successful. AKA, wow. Not much to say. His Vuelta alone was enough for the whole year. He will be so greatly missed. Almost 600 points at age 33. He went out with a bang.
But if there's one X-FACTOR for the season, it's obviously Jonas Gregaard. The dude scored >500 points for <$100k wages. That just doesn't happen. I planned him as Aranburu's foil for many of those longer hilly classics, and it worked perfectly. 71 hill did not stop him. Nothing does. I can't even imagine what his wage demands will be now, but what a rider. He actually scored more than Carthy! How?!! Obviously he's another guy whose success is not replicable, but I am a true believer in his skillset for this engine.
It took a whole lot of luck to get this top 5. I'll savor it, because luck can turn very quickly in this game. But I also like to think my planning helped maximize my roster, so that feels good too.
RIP Exxon Duke, David Veilleux, Double Feature, and Monster Energy
The rankings should now be correct thanks to Abhi doing the recalculation. The only change in teams is Gazelle overtakes LPH as well. No position changes in the individual top 10, but below that you'll have to look yourself
Big, big congratulations to knockout on the title! It has been a great journey to finally get here for you, and I’m thrilled for you to make it over the line this time.
A pity to see Sony go down, but it makes for a very interesting and fun follow next season, I’d say, looking at what direction Abhi’s project will take. And judging by the race thread, it looks like he’s ready for it
Very happy for DD to just make it! It always felt like a battle between Sony and Gazelle for the Lombardia race, and Aleotti delivering more than could be expected, was a remarkable moment. Excited to see how DD continues to build and rebuild his team. Last transfer season felt like the first step, and I suspect he has more in store for us.
For us, this season had many highlights, but also some major downs, results and racing wise. Happy to see us land safe with a good margin now at the end. Still like my leaders as rider types a lot, just really hope both Anderberg and Valter can be more consistent next year. Especially Anderberg, failing the top 10 Roubaix goal was possible our biggest down the whole year
It was always going to be hard to stay in for us, but we saw some total BS this year. Oomen immediatly throwing away his only chance at Le Tour on stage 1 (and De Plus doing exactly the same in Vuelta stage 1) definitely was the low point.
Thanks to all of those that keep the MG running, you guys have done an incredible job this season. Don’t think there’s been a smoother season that I can remember, thanks for being legends!
So happy to return to PT and amazingly have our best season yet, finishing inside the top-10 is a huge result for the team. I thought we would manage to be competitive enough to stay in the division with a bit of luck but would not have thought we could do as well as we have. Our future plans rely on staying up for at least a single season so cool to achieve that.
It all kind of hinged on how well Dunbar would adapt to the PT race schedule which luckily the did. I estimated about 1200 points if he had a good season and he managed a little more than that which is great.
Our new leaders did well. Gaviria was average for the most part, did well in his GT but inconsistent and had a terrible Qatar. His train worked well enough, but he didn’t really hit the heights of previous seasons. Latour had no luck during the first half of the season and couldn’t hit a good result, but his Vuelta performance definitely redeemed his season. Still a little below his capabilities, but he was fun to watch this season. Stüssi had an incredible season - he lived up to the hype and exceeded expectations by riding two great GT’s and being a good support rider for Dunbar and Latour. Can’t remember what we paid for him but it wasn’t enough, would have been a totally different season without him.
Our Indonesian contingent had a solid season. Ahmad Firdaus was awesome in his first maxed season - winning the u25 jersey at the Vuelta against all odds was so incredible. He rode really well as a support rider and definitely pleaded his case for future training. Nur Hasan did really well as Gaviria’s pilot fish. Hopefully we can find someone else for that role and he can have more freedom next season.
Congrats knockout in the title, so cool to see you take it out. Happy to see Rabobank and Carlsberg have great seasons and ELCO do so well as a promoting team. Sad to see all five teams down the bottom going down, I can see good cases for all to potentially come straight back up, and am excited to see what Grieg have in store.
Thanks again to all the reporters and all involved for a great season.
Big thank you to everyone involved in running another season!
Very happy to finally be on the podium of the overall rankings after spending so many years in the middle of the table and even fighting hard to avoid relegation ever since I got Remco. Glad it paid off though and I'm on the podium in his very first season at max stats.
It will be hard to judge next year if this was just a fluke or I really managed to set up a good team because Gerts and Formolo will decline even further. So some changes will definitely be happening in the main scorers area.
Congrats to knokout for finally taking the big crown! I was actually quite surprised when I realized you had yet to win the whole thing.
Big big save from Gazelle on the very last day. Sad to see Sony going down after only one season in the top tier in such dramatic fashion. Hope to see you back soon. And the same goes for everyone getting relegated this year.
To get the most important thing out of the way: Thank you so much for every report and all the work behind the scenes. Its so impressive how smooth this season went and i still really enjoy it a lot!
Obviously, i absolutely love to win the title. Ive been quite vocal about aiming for it a couple of times already and this was going to be our best opportunity to get it done. What was really special about this team is that everybody contributed. The two big stars while not without errors, both had big signature wins. Our loan leaders added very solid results. Our "next generation climbers" Plapp and Foss delivered. We had impressive output from our min wage free agent signings. Even guys like Holowesko who were questioned when we signed them had their moments.
In the first half of the season i constantly had the feeling that we performed at the bottom of our expected range. Not really underperformances but just never quite the success we were hoping for. Luckily that changed later with ToNE, Lithuania, etc
Thanks for all the congratulations and also the messages along the way. Really cool to see many of you cheering me on on this journey.
Vesuvio and King Power were the expected strong contenders but also cool to see Rabobank with such a strong saison entering the mix. I think for them it might have been a combination of being slightly underrated but also constantly performing at the top of their skills.
Carlsberg certainly the biggest surprise team for me.
It has been a great journey to finally get here for you, and I’m thrilled for you to make it over the line this time. 
