Let's have some fun with PCM again, as long as we can
This won't be like stories I've done in the past, because that's not possible. I don't know how long this wil run, nor how often updates will come.
The only thing I know is that every post should be fun, and then it will have been a success, whether it goes for 1 or 1000 pages. Hope you enjoy!
Database: RSM-PCMdaily 2019DB (edited the WGG team, you'll see) Difficulty: Starting at Easy because the game's changed quite a bit since the last time I played PCM. Still figuring some stuff out and getting back in the game. Will move up to Normal or Hard later on. Purpose: This'll be a mixture between a story and a career. I'll play most/some of the stages, but won't do a race per race update here. It will depend on the importance of the race, or if I want to move faster or slower.
I also apologize in advance for the lack of screenshots. While that often makes a story nicer to read, I don't think it's practical for me to do anymore. I'll try to include the occasional screenshot, but it'll be mostly text-based, and with some exported results, too. Sorry!
Those who know me will also take it as a given I'll be editing the save file during the game. When I start caring for a certain rider more, I'll be editing his potential and stats. I always edit games when I can during play, to shape the story more to my liking.
What will be different, though, is this won't be about the best rider in the world for once
Another approach this time around.
Enjoy! Thanks
Welcome to the WGG Project!
This will be my digital, open, journal for the next couple of years. As you may have heard in the news, we're about to launch an exciting new project with the Wanty - Groupe Gobert team. I'll shed some more light on the subject below.
Wanty - Groupe Gobert 2019 - ...
Wanty - Groupe Gobert has been a fantastic team ever since its conception, with a heavy focus on young talent. This will not change, on the contrary. But we are heading in a totally new direction from 2019 onwards. We've managed to get every single rider that was with us last year on a contract with a new team and we wish them all the best. From 2019, we ride with a 100% new squad.
How? Let me explain! I've been sworn to secrecy for years now, and I can't wait to finally let you know what I've been doing for the past years of my life.
Wanty - Groupe Gobert gave me a special assignment some 5-6 years ago. Immediately I went to work and started scouting, talking to, training, organising races for... young, motivated people all around Belgium. I've talked with and tested over 1000 young lads, hoping to make a career in cycling. Those young lads have now grown up to be strong, developing young adults, ready to finally take their first steps in the world of professional cycling. These men have been training together for a long time, some even for years and years now.
It was especially rewarding to work with young Belgians who feel at home in the mountains, but were given no opportunity to develop those skills in Belgium. I took them to the mountains regularly and I saw them grow stronger by the day.
Wanty - Groupe Gobert has now filled 20 spots with these men. They will wear our colors for the upcoming season, and hopefully for the coming 10 years at least. We will continue to scout for young talent, and we hope to give these lads everything we have to offer, and allow them to develop into the best riders they can be.
Our Wanty - Groupe Gobert family has just gotten a little bit bigger!
The Goals
This year, we have 20 neopro riders, fighting on the ProContinental level, so it wouldn't be right to expect too much from them. We want to give them a stage to show their talents.
We won't be riding in a Grand Tour, this year, but we'll race some WT races, especially some of the classics.
So what are our goals?
Let's be highly ambitious here. We have 3 goals.
1) Become a WT team with our 20 lads (and hopefully some new talents coming in later)
2) Deliver a first Belgian Grand Tour winner since De Muynck in 1978. Is one of our 20 lads up to it?
3) Win a Monument with one of our 20 boys.
Let's see if we can make our dreams come true! But most of all, we want to bring out the best in our riders, and offer them a team where they can come home to, where they feel they can develop into the strongest rider they can be.
2019 Season
Our first season will be one big test. I'll be holding my breath.
For the first season, we don't have leaders, domestiques or anything else. We have 20 brothers, who will fight for glory side by side. We have full confidence that they will ride for each other when the time requires it. We are here to support them and to offer a helping hand where necessary. Natural leaders will come out of the shadows, and we hope the strongest riders take the reigns without conflict, and that the others will find their own place in the team, too.
Our 2019 Squad
Here are the 20 lads who've been chosen to be part of our special project, starting this season. For a while I had Remco Evenepoel on my radar (who didn't?), but he made the decision to go to a bigger team. I wish him all the best there. I only hope that if he wins a Grand Tour, he does it after one of our guys can pull it off!
AERTS Jonas
23 years old
Fighter
Jonas is a real attacker. He will excel at getting in breakaways and making sure our name is heard over the television sets all around the world.
BAETS Tim
22 years old
Rider
When asked to describe Tim, only one word comes to mind: rider. Tim is one of those rare cases of riders who can just set a tempo and keep it up for hours and hours. We might turn him into a strong time trialist, but so far he's had little experience on a time trial bike. He just likes riding his bike on flat terrain, set a high pace and never slowing down.
BOUSAID Mustafa
20 years old
Time Trialist
Mustafa is a hard worker, real hard. He has a lot of discipline, so it's no accident he's a good time trial rider. He's also one of the boys who can handle cobblestones best, so he might perform well in our Flemish races.
BOUWERS Maarten
21 years old
Climber
Maarten feels at home on a climb, the longer the better. Unfortunately hsi time trialing abilities are not up to par. We really believe he can turn into a great climber, though, and we'll do everything to help him reach the top, literally!
CATELYN Kris
20 years old
All-Rounder
Kris is a special case. I've had him under my wing almost since the beginning. He can do anything, really. Eventually he'll have to choose which way he wants to go, but for now he can do anything he likes. He can climb, he's fast, he likes the cobbles and he can sit on a time trial bike well.
Mostly we'd love to see him taking on the Classics and one week stage races. But if he decides he wants to win the Tour de France, we might just believe he can pull it off, too.
CUYPER Thomas
20 years old
Climber
Thomas is Joris' older brother. He climbs well. He likes the Ardennes hills, but I see him going over Cols and mountains just as smoothly. He might be one of our chances at a Grand Tour victory one day.
CUYPER Joris
19 years old
Climber
Almost two years younger and Thomas' brother, Joris shares his brother's talent of climbing. He's a little bit less all-round, but his potential at riding uphill might be even greater. He's still very young, but he already shows great maturity in his training.
DIERICKX Daniel
21 years old
Classics Rider
Daniel is a wonderful lad to work with. Despite being so young, he's a very wise man. He knows exactly what his limits are and he works hard to press them a little more every day. He's also a very calm, good influence on the other boys. And then we haven't even spoken of his uncanny ability to ride cobblestones. He won't win in a sprint, but he has the engine to ride away alone if he must. If you talk about winning a Monument, Daniel may be our number one hope to pull that off.
FAVRE Per
20 years old
Climber
Per is one of the few boys from Wallonie in our squad. He's a decent enough climber, with plenty of margin left to improve. His acceleration is among the highest of our squad.
GAERDELEN Louis
22 years old
Climber
Louis is another pure climber. He just loves riding up a mountain. He's also a very gentle soul, who'll help a team mate without having to ask him.
HUYGE Roel
22 years old
Sprinter
The fastest man on our squad, without a doubt. We're not a classic Belgian squad, with many sprinters and classics riders. We have chosen to give those climbing Belgians more of a chance. But Roel is one of the exceptions. He's fast, very fast. His dream of winning Gent-Wevelgem isn't as silly as it once sounded to him. We'll work hard with him to make it come true.
LEROY Louis
21 years old
Classics Rider
Talking about exceptions, Louis is another rider who would've found his way into the professional circuit easily without our help. Yet we are very happy to have him with us. He's got everything he needs to be a top contender in the Flemish classics: he can ride cobbles, he can sprint and he manages to get over small hills with his power.
LI Chang
19 years old
Climber
Chang is a very special story. He came to us about two years ago. His parents moved here about five years ago. In no time, Chang picked up the language, and even the bike. He's very light and climbs very well. He's got the double nationality, but in cycling he'd like to represent China, and we fully support him in that.
MICHAUD Damien
20 years old
Stage Racer
You can't fit better into the definition of a stage racer as Damien does. He climbs well, rides the time trial bike well and recuperates well. We can see a bright future for him, if he keeps training hard!
POULIN Noah
23 years old
Climber
The senior of our squad. Funny to say that of a 23-year old man. Noah is someone with a great sense of duty. He climbs well, and Ardennes hills are his specialty. He grew up there, too. He dreams of Liège - Bastogne - Liège, and we here at Wanty - Groupe Gobert don't deal in breaking dreams. We deal in trying to fulfill them.
ROETS Arthur
20 years old
Classics Rider
Arthur is tailor-made for the Ardennes classics. Maybe on the long term he can contend on the cobbles, too, but he needs to get better at them, then. As far as hills go, though, he is a monster. He reminds me of a young Philippe Gilbert in some way. But, of course, he's not. He's Arthur Roets.
THOMAS Maxime
22 years old
Fighter
Within the team, Maxime has already been dubbed as the 'Thomas De Gendt from Wallonie', and maybe that's a good description of him. He is a relentless attacker, a powerhouse, someone who can climb decently, time trial decently, too. He'll be our wildcard in many a race. He's also the biggest engine we have on the team.
VAN AMSTEL Martijn
20 years old
Time Trialist
Martijn is the second "foreigner" on the team. He's from the Netherlands originally, but he's lived here for almost ten years now. Martijn is the best man we have on a time trial bike. Only 20 years old but he's already decided he wants to devote his career to the noble art of time trialing. We think that's a good idea and we want to help him develop that art as much as possible.
VANHECKEN Daan
23 years old
Stage Racer
Daan is actually a fairly good all-rounder, but mostly he's a stage racer. He's at a decent level already, but we suspect he may be a late-bloomer, and so we will definitely give him the necessary time to develop!
VUYST Brecht
22 years old
Sprinter
Nicknamed 'The Fist', Brecht is actually the gentlest person I know. He's a good sprinter, but with many other qualities seperating him from an "ordinary" sprinter. We picked him up from Cyclo-Cross, so he can handle a bike rather well!
Well, that's it for now. These are the boys that are going to have to make our project a success in the upcoming years. We're sure they won't let us down. And, who knows, there might be a future Grand Tour winner among them, or the next Ronde van Vlaanderen champion. It's okay to dream.
I'll see you when the racing starts!
- Ian
*---*---*---*---*---*---*---*---*---*
To get you to remember our boys a little easier, here are they listed according to specialty. We also asked every rider who they look up to the most, or a rider that inspires them. Often that will tell you something about how a rider is himself, but sometimes a climber just looks up at a sprinter, that's just the way it goes.
So with 'characteristic', I mean what other qualities do they posses. If one is listed as a climber, obviously his specialty is climbing, so it's more interesting to know what type of climber. One who also goes for GC, or one who's also good in one day races, or an attacker, or ..
Let's ride the story train as long as we can! May I just throw the final (stored since I don't know when) updates for my very own NRS story into the forum as well? Now that Ian and valverde have a go at story writing?
tsmoha wrote:
Let's ride the story train as long as we can! May I just throw the final (stored since I don't know when) updates for my very own NRS story into the forum as well? Now that Ian and valverde have a go at story writing?
Looking forward to this. Good luck!
I will answer for everyone, and say yes! You should!
---
Always liked Wanty as a team, so this project sounds very interesting
I know, time flies. We're slowly approaching the Belgian opening weekend, where we'll be making our WT debut. But we've had plenty of races under our belt already in the ProContinental circuit. And, let's be honest, this year we're going to make more of an impression there than in the World Tour, where we simply hope to color up the race and gain some experience.
There have been some highlights in the first few weeks of the season, as you may know. Our first race has actually been the best one, so far. I'm talking about the Tropical Amissa Bongo, of course!
We started our season wonderfully, with Louis Leroy and Arthur Roets finishing 8th and 9th respectively in the opening stage. Louis started stage 2 with the Young Rider's Jersey, but unfortunately had to give him up to Ryan Gibbons.
The next highlight came in stage 4, where Roel Huyge managed to finish 2nd, only 10 cm away from victory. But he didn't sit down to cry about it, no, he learned from his mistakes and managed to get us our first win of the season, in stage 5!
A win to treasure forever. Our first, thanks to Huyge!
Coming out of that race with the Best Team classification was the icing on the cake, though. We couldn't have asked for a better start of the season!
Tropica Amissa Bongo - General Classification - Top 15
Unfortunately, things have been quieter since. Huyge wasn't able to sprint another top 10 spot since then, and The Star of Bessèges was a bit of a letdown, too. GP Marseille could've been wonderful, but we were plagued by massive crashes. Though Maxime Thomas made up for that by getting in the breakaway and then leaving his group behind to ride a 20 km solo. He was caught eventually, though, and our first result was a 47th place.
Even so, a first win is massively important to such a young, inexperienced and new squad like ours, and we cherish it highly! But we don't live in the past, too, and we are already looking forward to the next challenges. We believe our moment of glory will come when the stronger riders get to their busy schedule in the WT races, and then the PCT circuit will be less inflated by stronger riders, like it is now.
When all else fails (or falls), Thomas will liven up the race!
Ollfardh - Sorry to disappoint you. Still, maybe Baugnies will win the Ronde, I don't know what's gonna happen
tsmoha - I say, yes! Let us return to the old days of the stories Cheers!
valverde321 - Thanks. You starting with something inspired me to do something, too.
Since I already raced a bit before I decided to make a "story" out of it, I've already got a first update coming (see above, haha). The rest will be slower, though Although, I do have a few days with nothing to do now, so I might take advantage of that, because it'll be until July before I get another couple of days with nothing to do
Croatia14 - Glad to hear, hope I can keep you interested!
Tamijo - Thanks! I hope so, too It's nice to be back on PCM.Daily again!
the_hoyle - Haha thanks a lot! I still don't know why so many people like(d) my stories, but I'm very happy and thankful that they do.
I'm thinking about a way to make you familiar with the riders the easiest way. Because now probably you read a lot of names (fictional riders) and it's hard to seperate one from the other.
So if anyone has a good idea, let me know.
Maybe I should include a screenshot of the squad and their current stats or something in the first post, so it gets easier to know the riders and their strengths?
So, we just got back from France, where we raced in the Tour de la Provence. And pardon my French, but what the hell was that?
Four days, two hilly stages, a sprinters stage, a team time trial and a whole lot of rain. Our boys are not the most experienced riders in the peloton, and it seems the peloton itself wasn't very careful neither in this race. I've seen crash after crash these past days.
In the opening stage, each member of our squad was in a crash at least once. Louis Leroy had to be taken to a hospital with a broken vertebrae. He's out for at least 5-6 weeks. Tough luck for us and most of all for him. His early season on the cobbles is out the window.
Still, Kris Catelyn gave us something to cheer about at the end of the day, by finishing 2nd in the sprint of a thinned out group! A wonderful performance from him here! Especially seeing as he was also involved with a big crash. But he didn't let it go to his head!
In the second stage, we saw some crashes, but nobody was seriously hurt. The next day was a team time trial, where we finished somewhere in the middle. The last day was another hilly stage. And... I really feel for the guy, I mean, Chang Li crashed three times during the stage and eventually had to be taken to the hospital with a broken thigh bone. How much bad luck can be have in this stage race?
After seeing both Roets and Catelyn take another tumble and spending 30 km catching up, we know the answer to that is: a lot.
Luckily both Roets and Catelyn managed to finish in the first group, so the race wasn't all bad. We've had our share of bad luck with the many crashes and injuries, but Catelyn got his first podium spot, we managed to finish 5th in the Team Rankings, and we did okay in the GC.
Tour de la Provence - General Classification - Top 20
Yay, you're back Like the setup for the story and awesome to have a first win already.
@hoyle - Perfect
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
tsmoha - The amount of crashes was unbelievable. I checked my settings, but crash ratio is at 1.1, so not very high. I'm going to lower it, though. It was really incredible. I think I've raced about 10 races in 3D already this season, and in every single race I've had more than 2 riders crash.
jandal7 - Good to be back glad you like it, thanks!
VoetsT - Cheers! I originally wanted to keep (part of) the real squad, but eventually decided on a whole new approach. Still like to keep the spirit of the team, though
To help you remember who's who in this team, with 20 fictional riders, I made this:
*---*---*---*---*---*---*---*---*---*
To get you to remember our boys a little easier, here are they listed according to specialty. We also asked every rider who they look up to the most, or a rider that inspires them. Often that will tell you something about how a rider is himself, but sometimes a climber just looks up at a sprinter, that's just the way it goes.
So with 'characteristic', I mean what other qualities do they posses. If one is listed as a climber, obviously his specialty is climbing, so it's more interesting to know what type of climber. One who also goes for GC, or one who's also good in one day races, or an attacker, or ..
Climbers
Name
Characteristic
Inspired by
Thomas Cuyper
GC Rider
Alberto Contador
Joris Cuyper
Pure Climber
Andy Schleck
Chang Li
Pure Climber
Lucien Van Impe
Maarten Bouwers
Pure Climber
Nairo Quintana
Louis Gaerdelen
Potential GC Rider
Fausto Coppi
Per Favre
Puncher
Jan Bakelants
Stage Racers
Name
Characteristic
Inspired by
Damien Michaud
Diesel Rider
Ivan Basso
Maxime Thomas
Attackers
Thomas De Gendt
Daan Vanhecken
Diesel Rider
Jurgen Van Den Broeck
Punchers
Name
Characteristic
Inspired by
Noah Poulin
GC Rider
Tim Wellens
Arthur Roets
All-Rounder
Philippe Gilbert
Kris Catelyn
All-Rounder
Alejandro Valverde
Jonas Aerts
Attacker
Enrico Gasparotto
Classics Riders
Name
Characteristic
Inspired by
Louis Leroy
Fast Finisher
Tom Boonen
Daniel Dierickx
Big Engine Rider
Roger De Vlaeminck
Flat Riders
Name
Characteristic
Inspired by
Mustafa Bousaid
Time Trialer
Tony Martin
Martijn Van Amstel
Time Trialer
Tom Dumoulin
Tim Baets
Pure Flat Rider
Stijn Vandenbergh
Sprinters
Name
Characteristic
Inspired by
Roel Huyge
Pure Sprinter
Mark Cavendish
Brecht De Vuyst
Explosive Rider
Freddy Maertens
I added this to the first post, too, for reference. Hopefully this'll help you to get to know the boys faster and follow the story easier!
Some great names in there - looking forward to seeing how they develop towards and around those models!
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
jandal7 - Just imagine all of them becoming as strong as their inspirations. What a team, huh
Croatia14 - No, and that's a bit the point wanted a Belgian team where the focus goes to climbing mainly. To give Belgian talents a chance to stay in a Belgian team but have all the possibilities of exploiting their talents. And hopefully produce a Belgian GT winner, within a Belgian team!
