@TheManxMissile - Getting that second season is the most important goal.
@DarkWolf - Take care of Luis Enrique! We'll make sure Ahlstrand sees the top step of the podium multiple times
@redordead - The only plan we have is winning!
@Nemolito - If we do relegate I already know the cursed one is.



In addition to two extra loanees, we signed what has perhaps been our weirdest signing in our almost ten-year history. So much so that the MGUCI arbitration committee had to step in and determine which team had a valid signature for the rider in question. Luckily Minions are very good lawyers so we got the definitive and non-appealable signature.

Tom Jelte Slagter





We thought we had lost him, but an invalid bid brought the 34-year old Dutchman into our squad at last. Tom Jelte Slagter is a famed puncheur and will be Kinoshita's top lieutenant in the important races. He might be past his prime but still scored decently at the Sauber team last season. They did not renew his contract and we swooped in for a 70,000 deal. We're looking forward to him slaughtering the peloton in the upcoming season.

Yannis Voisard





Yannis Voisard also rode for the Sauber team last year. He is still under contract there but is loaned out to us to gain experience. The Swiss climber joins the team for a season to learn from our climbing squad. Despite abandoning the academy we still have four young riders, as we've now become the summer school for many talents. We don't mind, it lands us nice riders like Yannis who will do well this season.

Einer Augusto Rubio





Einer Augusto Rubio joins on loan from Bordeaux Métropole, who bought him from Tinkoff, who had loaned him out to Indosat. That's four teams from the end of last year to the start of this year, better call him "Mr Worldwide". The Colombian is 25 years old and a talented climber, who will learn from the many years of experience we have in this field. His age means he is still eligible for the white jersey, which might add a few necessary bonus points to our tally

@SotD - We are here to stay, hopefully
@DarkWolf - Everyone has their regrets and failures. Bet Rubio was on my radar as well back in the day, but at least we can have him for a season now.



The Minions have assembled their first ever ProTour team in hopes of getting to do it all again. Twenty-one riders are signed on, of which four are on loan. Their statistics and specialities are displayed below.

Nat.	Name	FL	MO	HI	TT	ST	RS	RC	CB	SP	AC	FG	DH	PR	Age	Wage
	T. Kinoshita	73	72	83	66	80	77	73	59	68	77	73	71	66	32	1 mil
	J. Ahlstrand	73	59	66	59	73	72	77	66	82	81	58	63	71	33	500k
	M. Cattaneo	69	81	69	78	75	79	78	53	50	69	61	63	78	33	500k
	D. Kalaba	74	65	69	70	70	72	76	57	79	79	58	68	78	27	185k
	R. Dennis	71	73	74	77	71	73	65	52	64	66	68	55	80	33	300k
	A. Vosekalns	66	78	75	62	69	73	72	51	67	71	81	68	62	31	110k
	M. Bjerg	75	64	68	79	73	77	73	63	68	70	71	67	79	25	110k
	N. Brown	68	75	73	76	74	73	72	60	58	71	65	64	77	32	110k
	A. Hodeg	72	53	65	67	69	74	70	51	79	78	53	64	73	27	100k
	R. Barbier	75	50	67	56	72	71	76	68	77	79	65	64	60	31	50k
	J. Dakteris	75	55	64	62	74	70	73	72	77	77	63	61	62	32	50k
	L. Sweeck	73	62	68	68	71	72	62	76	70	71	67	75	71	30	60k
	I. Bolivar	73	61	66	69	74	70	69	77	64	69	68	75	69	32	50k
	T. J. Slagter	66	76	77	64	68	70	69	50	59	68	80	77	64	34	70k
	D. Quintana	69	76	71	70	73	72	76	50	61	63	67	64	70	31	50k
	L. Marcos	74	62	73	63	71	65	70	74	65	70	73	64	65	32	50k
	E. A. Rubio	66	75	72	64	75	73	73	60	60	71	71	64	64	25	Loan
	M. De Witte	74	60	68	61	75	72	67	75	71	69	64	65	61	30	50k
	N. Alexander	72	72	72	71	71	70	71	60	61	67	66	68	71	25	Loan
	Y. Voisard	66	73	70	62	68	69	73	60	61	65	71	69	64	25	Loan
	C. Perez	71	63	66	74	72	71	71	69	66	68	74	69	74	24	Loan

On the mountains we keep our leader from last season. We know Cattaneo is unlikely to have another super season but there is still plenty of points in him. Vosekalns will target GC stage hunting while Quintana and loan-ins Rubio, Voisard and Alexander support.

We dislike the hills, but that was the past. Kinoshita is in another league compared to our previous leaders and for once we have a lot of faith he will do well. Support is somewhat thin but the climbers can chip in. Slagter will be his most trusted lieutenant.

Bjerg has fully grown and we look forward to his progress in time trials. Dennis and Brown will once again target the races with a mixture of climbing and time trials, while Perez is loaned in to help out in team time trials.

The cobblestone trio becomes the cobblestone quartet as Bolivar joins Sweeck, De Witte and Marcos. Still no big expectations on this discipline so any points position will be celebrated.

Sprinting remains an important part of our team. Ahlstrand is the big leader with Kalaba taking the minor races. The crumbs are left for Hodeg who will also act as the Swede's lead-out. For the train we brought in Barbier and Dakteris.

Preview Minions 2023 accessories
(best bidon ever?)

@OlegTinkov - It would be an honor to drink our banana smoothies from that



Time for the cucumber news period, between transfers and the first races. We will reveal our goals for the upcoming season and showcase our (special) jerseys.

Goals

Tour de France	Top 5
Tour de Suisse	Win
Amstel Gold Race	Top 3
Stage wins in a season	8
Team Standings	Avoid relegation

It's everyone's dream to win the Tour de France, but we're happy to finish in the top five. It's not everyone's dream to win the Tour de Suisse, but we want to win it. In a rare case of pre-transfer strategy, the top three in Amstel Gold Race suddenly becomes achievable with Kinoshita in the squad. Eight stage wins are definitely on the cards and avoiding relegation is the ultimate goal.

Jerseys



The jersey design has not changed much, just remove the Subwoolfer branding. There is a special Cuban jersey for Perez (TT) and Marcos (RR), and a Italian tricolore for Cattaneo (TT).

Our first month in the ProTour is done. Are we a worthy member of the division, or have we owned everyone?

Tour of Tasmania

Our debut race Down Under saw us stage hunting with Kalaba for the sprint, Kinoshita for the hilly stage and Bjerg for the time trial. The Serbian finished sixth in the opening stage, while the Japanese made a great debut in our colors by finishing second on the hilly stage. However, almost everyone kept up with the pack, meaning Bjerg suddenly had a very good GC opportunity. The young Dane did not waste it by finishing sixth on the stage, taking the same place in the GC, and winning the young rider classification as well!

Pos	Rider	Team	Time
1	Taylor Phinney	MOL Cycling Team	8h43'44
6	Mikkel Bjerg	Minions	+ 33
53	Rohan Dennis	Minions	+ 42
54	Nathan Brown	Minions	+ 44
104	Dusan Kalaba	Minions	+ 1'21
110	Dayer Quintana	Minions	+ 1'25
147	Tomohiro Kinoshita	Minions	+ 1'53
158	Leandro Marcos	Minions	+ 2'04
168	Tom Jelte Slagter	Minions	+ 2'14

Rating:

Tour of Qatar

We hoped to keep the momentum into Qatar with another big signing: Ahlstrand. Five out of six stages were destined to end in a sprint, but 21st and 17th on the first two stages made us wonder if he was the big sprinter we thought he was. The next stages went better with an eleventh place, followed by a good sixth place. The fifth stage saw him fall down again as he finished in 18th place. The race concluded with a short time trial, in which Dennis finished ninth at four seconds, but with all the bonus seconds on the flat stages it only resulted in a 26th place overall.

Pos	Rider	Team	Time
1	Jasper Philipsen	Polar	15h14'31
26	Rohan Dennis	Minions	+ 44
53	Mikkel Bjerg	Minions	+ 46
68	Jonas Ahlstrand	Minions	+ 50
103	Cristian Perez	Minions	+ 55
108	Alvaro Hodeg	Minions	+ 56
120	Laurens Sweeck	Minions	+ 59
173	Janis Dakteris	Minions	+ 1'13
178	Rudy Barbier	Minions	+ 1'16

Rating:

Great Ocean Road Classic

The Swede would get a second chance at a first impression not long thereafter, against a much weaker field and a race he finished fifth in the year before. As one of the big favorites we were in a position where we needed to chase after the breakaway, which we did with enough time to prepare for a sprint. However, our train would fail to depart and Ahlstrand did not get a good position, finishing a very disappointing twenty-third.

Pos	Rider	Team	Time
1	Nick Van der Lijke	EA Vesuvio	3h03'17
23	Jonas Ahlstrand	Minions	s.t.
57	Janis Dakteris	Minions	s.t.
65	Alvaro Hodeg	Minions	s.t.
67	Mathias De Witte	Minions	s.t.
72	Laurens Sweeck	Minions	s.t.
82	Isaac Bolivar	Minions	s.t.
111	Rudy Barbier	Minions	s.t.
126	Nathan Alexander	Minions	s.t.

Rating:

Rankings

One good and two not so good races sees us in thirteenth place in the rankings. This early in the season there is hardly anything to conclude from this, we're just hoping we remain out of the relegation zone all year. Individually, Bjerg has made the best start and is also thirteenth in the rankings, with Kinoshita and Dennis also making the top fifty.

Pos		Team	Total	RD	PpRD	Proj
1		EA Vesuvio	732	11	66.55	11979
2		Polar	719	11	65.36	11765
3		MOL Cycling Team	631	11	57.36	10325
4		Lidl Cycling	490	9	54.44	9799
5		Moser - Sygic	467	11	42.45	7641
6		Cedevita	434	11	39.45	7101
7		ZARA - Irizar	406	11	36.91	6644
8		Grieg-Maersk	391	9	43.44	7819
9		cycleYorkshire	385	11	35	6300
10		King Power	373	9	41.44	7459
11		Team Puma - SAP	370	11	33.64	6055
12		Rabobank	299	9	33.22	5980
13		Minions	298	11	27.09	4876
14		Amaysim Australia.com	282	11	25.64	4615
15		Aker - MOT	272	9	30.22	5440
16		Tinkoff - La Datcha Team	233	9	25.89	4660
17		Carlsberg - Danske Bank	229	9	25.44	4579
18		ISA - Hexacta	215	9	23.89	4300
19		ELCO - ABEA	208	9	23.11	4160
20		Gazelle	146	9	16.22	2920
21		Evonik - ELKO	138	11	12.55	2259
22		Binance	101	9	11.22	2020

Pos	Rider	Nat		Team	Total Points
1	Jasper Philipsen	BEL		Polar	517
13	Mikkel Bjerg	DEN		Minions	152
40	Tomohiro Kinoshita	JPN		Minions	35
48	Rohan Dennis	AUS		Minions	31
75	Jonas Ahlstrand	SWD		Minions	18
103	Dusan Kalaba	SER		Minions	12
125	Nathan Brown	USA		Minions	10
243	Alvaro Hodeg	COL		Minions	5
244	Rudy Barbier	FRA		Minions	5
245	Janis Dakteris	LAT		Minions	5
246	Laurens Sweeck	BEL		Minions	5
247	Tom Jelte Slagter	NED		Minions	5
248	Dayer Quintana	COL		Minions	5
249	Leandro Marcos	CUB		Minions	5
250	Cristian Perez	CUB		Minions	5

@Fabianski - Proud of Bjerg stepping up, a lot of U25 points will help us survive. Kinoshita looks promising and Ahlstrand is hopefully just a rough start.
@redordead - You win some, you lose some. Just need more Ws than Ls and all will be fine.

After January comes February. The new baby smell is gone, it's time to show we deserve to stay in the ProTour. This month includes the much feared triple header which stretches our squad selections to the maximum, not selecting the maximum eight for any of those, which was mathematically impossible with a squad of 21.

Copenhagen - Malmo TTT

We have been in this race three times before, with a best result of ninth, but were never able to score points. We have some focus on team time trials but admit there are far better squads out there, such as EA Vesuvio winning the race for the third time in a row. Twelfth place is smack bang in the middle, and being less than a minute behind is perfectly acceptable.

Pos	Team	Time
1	EA Vesuvio	1h02'52
12	Minions	+ 49

Rating:

Tirreno - Adriatico

The first of the triple clash, and the one with the mountains. This forced us to select Cattaneo for this race, despite the lack of long time trials. A decent prologue gave us some hope of a good GC result but the competition on the mountain stages was too strong, finishing seventeenth overall. Rubio tried to compensate with two breakaway attempts on the final stages, losing a scoring position in the U25. Our most valuable rider of the race was Kalaba, who finished second on the third stage, after already finishing seventh on the second stage. The fact that this was our (spoiler alert) best race of the triple header should say enough.

Pos	Rider	Team	Time
1	Merhawi Kudus	Moser - Sygic	29h55'26
17	Mattia Cattaneo	Minions	+ 4'22
39	Andris Vosekalns	Minions	+ 7'51
70	Dayer Quintana	Minions	+ 14'40
80	Einer Augusto Rubio	Minions	+ 18'21
100	Dusan Kalaba	Minions	+ 23'55
109	Yannis Voisard	Minions	+ 28'41
169	Rudy Barbier	Minions	+ 1h23'42

Rating:

Paris - Nice

Paris - Nice contains hills and time trials, so we thought it would be suited to Dennis, winning similar races last season. Brown might also score a decent result. However, both lost time on the hillier stages, rendering a GC assault futile. Best individual results came from Hodeg and Bjerg, who finished seventh on the opening sprint and stage five time trial respectively. The latter would also be our best rider in the GC, though only in a far-away 44th place.

Pos	Rider	Team	Time
1	Tom Wirtgen	EA Vesuvio	31h09'04
45	Mikkel Bjerg	Minions	+ 5'08
52	Rohan Dennis	Minions	+ 5'30
77	Cristian Perez	Minions	+ 6'33
90	Nathan Alexander	Minions	+ 7'11
99	Nathan Brown	Minions	+ 7'34
118	Alvaro Hodeg	Minions	+ 9'05
133	Janis Dakteris	Minions	+ 10'06

Rating:

Classique du Grand-Duché

The shortest of the triple header is a classic around Luxembourg tailor made for puncheurs. We send Kinoshita here as no-brainer, though we might have underestimated the amount of climbing. A well-rounded climber in Herklotz won the race, while our Japanese ace only finished in fourteenth. He only had five teammates at his disposal, which might have contributed to the lackluster result.

Pos	Rider	Team	Time
1	Silvio Herklotz	Team Puma - SAP	5h37'33
14	Tomohiro Kinoshita	Minions	+ 51
46	Tom Jelte Slagter	Minions	+ 3'53
86	Mathias De Witte	Minions	+ 7'47
106	Leandro Marcos	Minions	+ 8'12
117	Laurens Sweeck	Minions	+ 10'01
160	Isaac Bolivar	Minions	+ 15'00

Rating:

Tour of Ukraine

Two time trials and a hilly stage, so a lot of riders capable of scoring. Dennis and Brown target the GC, and both were in the top twenty after the first stage. We also brought Kinoshita for the hilly stage, in which he finished a satisfactory fourth. What was satisfactory was both our GC aces finishing behind a split, ruining a GC result. Bjerg was our highest finisher in the closing time trial, fourteenth, but having three different riders as best result on the three different stages means none of them has a good GC position, with all four mentioned riders around fiftieth place.

Pos	Rider	Team	Time
1	Taylor Phinney	MOL Cycling Team	3h36'10
48	Tomohiro Kinoshita	Minions	+ 3'35
49	Rohan Dennis	Minions	+ 3'37
56	Mikkel Bjerg	Minions	+ 3'43
57	Nathan Brown	Minions	+ 3'44
68	Tom Jelte Slagter	Minions	+ 3'55
74	Nathan Alexander	Minions	+ 4'01
80	Dayer Quintana	Minions	+ 4'06
169	Leandro Marcos	Minions	+ 6'54

Rating:

Milano - San Remo

Our first ever monument, and the longest race we have ever ridden. Milano - San Remo can go to either the sprinters or the puncheurs, so we bring top class in both: Ahlstrand and Kinoshita. In the end the race was won in a sprint, but our sprinter did not have the legs and worked for the puncheur. Kinoshita's eleventh place is not bad in that light, but makes us wonder what we could have achieved had the roles been reversed.

Pos	Rider	Team	Time
1	Caleb Ewan	ISA - Hexacta	6h52'07
11	Tomohiro Kinoshita	Minions	s.t.
58	Janis Dakteris	Minions	s.t.
64	Jonas Ahlstrand	Minions	s.t.
76	Rudy Barbier	Minions	s.t.
105	Leandro Marcos	Minions	s.t.
139	Nathan Alexander	Minions	s.t.
166	Dayer Quintana	Minions	s.t.
187	Alvaro Hodeg	Minions	+ 12'12

Rating:

Rankings

A huge drop was anticipated, and frankly we're surprised a team is still below us. A lot of cobblestone races in the next month means our potential to climb back up is quite low. Bjerg is still our highest point scorer as all the leaders failed this month. With points in the PT available to all finishers, every rider has already scored points.

Pos	Last		Team	Total	RD	PpRD	Proj
1	1		EA Vesuvio	2208	35	63.09	11356
2	6		Cedevita	1760	35	50.29	9052
3	2		Polar	1733	35	49.51	8912
4	3		MOL Cycling Team	1420	43	33.02	5944
5	11		Team Puma - SAP	1408	43	32.74	5893
6	5		Moser - Sygic	1387	35	39.63	7133
7	7		ZARA - Irizar	1292	35	36.91	6644
8	19		ELCO - ABEA	1213	38	31.92	5746
9	17		Carlsberg - Danske Bank	1169	38	30.76	5537
10	20		Gazelle	1091	38	28.71	5168
11	18		ISA - Hexacta	1067	30	35.57	6403
12	9		cycleYorkshire	1041	35	29.74	5353
13	15		Aker - MOT	1014	38	26.68	4802
14	14		Amaysim Australia.com	986	43	22.93	4127
15	4		Lidl Cycling	972	30	32.4	5832
16	10		King Power	920	38	24.21	4358
17	22		Binance	888	38	23.37	4207
18	16		Tinkoff - La Datcha Team	807	38	21.24	3823
19	8		Grieg-Maersk	750	38	19.74	3553
20	21		Evonik - ELKO	735	35	21	3780
21	13		Minions	708	35	20.23	3641
22	12		Rabobank	706	38	18.58	3344

Pos	Last	Rider	Nat		Team	Total Points
1	1	Jasper Philipsen	BEL		Polar	814
32	13	Mikkel Bjerg	DEN		Minions	180
49	40	Tomohiro Kinoshita	JPN		Minions	143
96	103	Dusan Kalaba	SER		Minions	59
109	48	Rohan Dennis	AUS		Minions	50
117	427	Mattia Cattaneo	ITA		Minions	46
178	248	Dayer Quintana	COL		Minions	26
189	125	Nathan Brown	USA		Minions	25
204	75	Jonas Ahlstrand	SWD		Minions	23
261	250	Cristian Perez	CUB		Minions	18
262	243	Alvaro Hodeg	COL		Minions	18
272	247	Tom Jelte Slagter	NED		Minions	17
311	428	Andris Vosekalns	LAT		Minions	15
312	244	Rudy Barbier	FRA		Minions	15
313	245	Janis Dakteris	LAT		Minions	15
314	249	Leandro Marcos	CUB		Minions	15
342	432	Nathan Alexander	TRI		Minions	12
398	246	Laurens Sweeck	BEL		Minions	10
444	430	Einer Augusto Rubio	COL		Minions	6
482	429	Isaac Bolivar	COL		Minions	5
483	431	Mathias De Witte	BEL		Minions	5
484	433	Yannis Voisard	SWI		Minions	5

After a good January and a bad February follows March. A race with a lot of cobblestones, so not much hope of gaining ground to those above us. A month we'll have to get through and not give up.

Ronde van Nederland

Both Ahlstrand and Kinoshita for this flat/hilly combo of a race in one of the flattest countries on earth. The Swede opened with a tenth place on the first stage, followed by a fifth place on the second. Kinoshita finished in the front group on the final stage, in sixth place to be precise, but bonus seconds pushed him down to eleventh. Could have been better, but an amazing result compared to what will follow.

Pos	Rider	Team	Time
1	Kaden Groves	Amaysim Australia.com	13h00'49
11	Tomohiro Kinoshita	Minions	+ 28
48	Tom Jelte Slagter	Minions	+ 2'15
57	Jonas Ahlstrand	Minions	+ 3'06
82	Dayer Quintana	Minions	+ 3'17
100	Leandro Marcos	Minions	s.t.
111	Laurens Sweeck	Minions	+ 4'57
154	Rudy Barbier	Minions	+ 6'53
165	Janis Dakteris	Minions	+ 7'33

Rating:

Praha - Karlovy Vary - Praha

A prologue and a long time trial would be ideal for Bjerg, but guess who we did not field this race. Instead, we hope for a decent result from Cattaneo and Dennis. 17th and 24th was not bad, but the Dane could have done better and taken the white jersey home with ease. The two flat stages had opposite results for Ahlstrand, finishing nineteenth and second, his best result of the season so far.

Pos	Rider	Team	Time
1	Mads Würtz	Grieg-Maersk	9h59'53
17	Mattia Cattaneo	Minions	+ 1'35
24	Rohan Dennis	Minions	+ 1'56
105	Isaac Bolivar	Minions	+ 5'05
140	Laurens Sweeck	Minions	+ 7'10
156	Janis Dakteris	Minions	+ 8'14
161	Mathias De Witte	Minions	+ 8'44
168	Jonas Ahlstrand	Minions	+ 9'02
184	Rudy Barbier	Minions	+ 11'27

Rating:

Strada Appia Antica

Let the pain begin, because let's face it, the only way Bolivar, De Witte, Marcos or Sweeck wins is if the entire field is wiped out in a crash. The quartet wasn't even strong enough to get into the break, with Sweeck our highest finisher in 64th.

Pos	Rider	Team	Time
1	Hampus Anderberg	Aker - MOT	5h53'57
64	Laurens Sweeck	Minions	+ 4'39
70	Isaac Bolivar	Minions	s.t.
72	Leandro Marcos	Minions	s.t.
124	Mathias De Witte	Minions	+ 7'42
135	Nathan Alexander	Minions	+ 10'00
138	Cristian Perez	Minions	s.t.
178	Yannis Voisard	Minions	+ 15'15

Rating:

Macskako Kerekparverseny

Things would improve over in Hungary. Alexander got into the break but the Antiguan and/or Barbudan was one of the weaker riders in there, but he did beat Bolivar in the finish order! Sweeck had good legs today and finished in twentieth place, much better than we anticipated!

Pos	Rider	Team	Time
1	Lukasz Wisniowski	Aker - MOT	4h03'58
20	Laurens Sweeck	Minions	+ 2'13
90	Mathias De Witte	Minions	+ 4'28
93	Leandro Marcos	Minions	+ 4'39
119	Nathan Alexander	Minions	+ 7'28
132	Isaac Bolivar	Minions	+ 12'02
138	Cristian Perez	Minions	+ 12'38
156	Yannis Voisard	Minions	+ 15'44

Rating:

Ronde van Vlaanderen

A monument, so obviously we want to give something extra here. Dakteris is not bad on cobbles and thus a logical target for the breakaway, but a breakaway could never win a race this prestigious. De Witte finished best of the Minions in 39th.

Pos	Rider	Team	Time
1	Jan Polanc	Evonik - ELKO	6h36'08
39	Mathias De Witte	Minions	+ 8'21
76	Leandro Marcos	Minions	+ 14'11
77	Isaac Bolivar	Minions	s.t.
85	Laurens Sweeck	Minions	+ 15'27
114	Janis Dakteris	Minions	+ 24'34
144	Cristian Perez	Minions	+ 33'42
145	Nathan Alexander	Minions	s.t.
166	Yannis Voisard	Minions	+ 45'40

Rating:

E3 Prijs

The last one, of the month, but the pain will continue into April with Paris - Roubaix. First the E3 Prijs, where Bolivar held on to the chasing pack for some time, being important enough to receive a mention of being dropped. A finishing position of 27th is not bad compared to the previous races.

Pos	Rider	Team	Time
1	David Per	Carlsberg - Danske Bank	5h21'35
27	Isaac Bolivar	Minions	+ 5'21
45	Laurens Sweeck	Minions	+ 6'12
81	Mathias De Witte	Minions	+ 9'55
105	Janis Dakteris	Minions	+ 14'58
113	Cristian Perez	Minions	+ 16'13
114	Leandro Marcos	Minions	s.t.
141	Nathan Alexander	Minions	+ 20'54
153	Yannis Voisard	Minions	+ 24'18

Rating:

Rankings

Having a bad month, even being generous with the banana ratings, was always calculated in. It unfortunately means we are at the bottom of the rankings, by quite some margin too. Positive things to look forward to are Ahlstrand finally finding a gear, Kinoshita being let lose in the Ardennes and obviously the Giro.

Pos	Last		Team	Total	RD	PpRD	Proj
1	1		EA Vesuvio	2875	50	57.5	10350
2	13		Aker - MOT	2607	53	49.19	8854
3	2		Cedevita	2399	50	47.98	8636
4	4		MOL Cycling Team	2291	64	35.8	6444
5	3		Polar	2248	50	44.96	8093
6	20		Evonik - ELKO	2194	56	39.18	7052
7	5		Team Puma - SAP	2117	58	36.5	6570
8	9		Carlsberg - Danske Bank	2057	53	38.81	6986
9	18		Tinkoff - La Datcha Team	2004	53	37.81	6806
10	8		ELCO - ABEA	1958	53	36.94	6649
11	19		Grieg-Maersk	1942	53	36.64	6595
12	14		Amaysim Australia.com	1914	64	29.91	5384
13	16		King Power	1913	53	36.09	6496
14	10		Gazelle	1856	59	31.46	5663
15	7		ZARA - Irizar	1827	56	32.63	5873
16	15		Lidl Cycling	1798	51	35.25	6345
17	12		cycleYorkshire	1762	50	35.24	6343
18	6		Moser - Sygic	1746	50	34.92	6286
19	22		Rabobank	1688	53	31.85	5733
20	11		ISA - Hexacta	1556	45	34.58	6224
21	17		Binance	1337	59	22.66	4079
22	21		Minions	1125	50	22.5	4050

Pos	Last	Rider	Nat		Team	Total Points
1	2	Tom Wirtgen	LUX		EA Vesuvio	1036
51	49	Tomohiro Kinoshita	JPN		Minions	212
61	32	Mikkel Bjerg	DEN		Minions	180
122	117	Mattia Cattaneo	ITA		Minions	84
146	109	Rohan Dennis	AUS		Minions	72
160	204	Jonas Ahlstrand	SWD		Minions	66
167	398	Laurens Sweeck	BEL		Minions	61
173	96	Dusan Kalaba	SER		Minions	59
256	314	Leandro Marcos	CUB		Minions	40
263	482	Isaac Bolivar	COL		Minions	39
267	261	Cristian Perez	CUB		Minions	38
292	313	Janis Dakteris	LAT		Minions	35
293	483	Mathias De Witte	BEL		Minions	35
310	342	Nathan Alexander	TRI		Minions	32
319	178	Dayer Quintana	COL		Minions	31
352	272	Tom Jelte Slagter	NED		Minions	27
373	189	Nathan Brown	USA		Minions	25
374	484	Yannis Voisard	SWI		Minions	25
375	312	Rudy Barbier	FRA		Minions	25
427	262	Alvaro Hodeg	COL		Minions	18
441	311	Andris Vosekalns	LAT		Minions	15
485	444	Einer Augusto Rubio	COL		Minions	6

We're at the bottom of the rankings, so the only way is up. The month of April contains three very important races. The start of the Ardennes triple for Kinoshita, the first Grand Tour of the Year and Veenendaal - Veenendaal, which is and always will be a must-win race.

Paris - Roubaix

But we start April where we left off in March. Paris - Roubaix is a prestigious and historic race which everyone wants to win, but we simply don't have the power in the team to achieve that. Bolivar attacked in the middle of the race to get some positive air time as earlier Dakteris failed to make the break and De Witte suffered a puncture. The Colombian would be the first to cross the line in the Velodrome in thirty-fourth place.

Pos	Rider	Team	Time
1	Floris Gerts	Rabobank	5h59'06
34	Isaac Bolivar	Minions	+ 5'58
57	Mathias De Witte	Minions	+ 8'25
61	Laurens Sweeck	Minions	s.t.
69	Janis Dakteris	Minions	+ 10'50
83	Leandro Marcos	Minions	+ 14'55
102	Cristian Perez	Minions	+ 21'50
161	Nathan Alexander	Minions	+ 48'15
170	Yannis Voisard	Minions	+ 53'42

Rating:

Giro d'Italia

The first Grand Tour of the year is the Giro, and we bring a strong squad. No GC ambition, but Vosekalns is an expert stage and KoM hunter, and a lot of flat stages means a lot of chances for Ahlstrand. Dennis opened strong with a seventh place in the prologue, and Ahlstrand came close to winning the second and fourth stage, finishing in second and third respectively. After the fifth stage where he finished a disappointing tenth, he was up to third in the GC, but a stint in pink was not to be with the tougher stages looming. Vosekalns finished in tenth from the breakaway on the first mountain stage, concluding a successful first week.



After an eleventh place for Dennis in the TT and a sixth place for Ahlstrand in the next sprint, it was back to the higher mountains with Vosekalns targeting the breakaways. He was in the stage eleven breakaway, which made it all the way to the finish line where the Latvian finished fourth. More importantly, the points he took throughout the day landed him the white leader's jersey for that category. He would keep it the next day as there were no points on offer on the flat stage (a fifth place by Ahlstrand), and the next day as well despite scoring no points while in the breakaway. After the mountain time trial Dombrowski took the lead in that classification, but as he was also leading the GC at the time Vosekalns still wore the jersey.



Ahlstrand only finished eleventh on the fifteenth stage, the podium results from the first days feeling like a distant memory. Vosekalns took a point for the mountains classification on the next stage but enough to take the jersey proper. Stage seventeen would see our biggest success this season so far, as Ahlstrand finally found his legs again and displaced the opposition to take the win and take to the podium! Rubio went into the breakaway on stages eighteen and nineteen while Vosekalns saved energy for the final stage, but the Colombian was not an adequate replacement. The sprint train of Hodeg, Barbier and Dakteris failed to make the time limit, leaving us with five riders in the race. Stage twenty would be a historic stage in the context of the race as Shikai came from seven minutes behind to win the race, but as far our role in it, it was quite disappointing with Vosekalns dropping outside the top ten in the KoM classification. Ahlstrand had barely made the time limit here, which gave him the opportunity for one last dance. A second place in Venice was enough to claim the purple jersey, the one for the points classification.



Concluding, the race was successful. Vosekalns was our highest GC finisher in 54th, but that was never the aim. We were nicely active in breakaways even though it yielded little points in the end, but bringing Ahlstrand for the sprints was a golden move with a few good results, one win and a trip to the final podium as outcome. If every GC could be like this we might still stand a chance to survive in the ProTour.

Pos	Rider	Team	Time
1	Chen Shikai	Polar	77h16'53
54	Andris Vosekalns	Minions	+ 1h08'22
83	Einer Augusto Rubio	Minions	+ 1h43'43
132	Rohan Dennis	Minions	+ 3h05'12
159	Jonas Ahlstrand	Minions	+ 4h01'28
161	Cristian Perez	Minions	+ 4h09'16
DNF	Rudy Barbier	Minions
DNF	Alvaro Hodeg	Minions
DNF	Janis Dakteris	Minions

Rating:

GP Liechtenstein

This race is not really suited to Cattaneo, and Vosekalns was off hunting the polka dots in the Giro, so leadership in the toughest race of the year fell to Quintana and Slagter. A Quintana finished sixteenth, but that was his brother Nairo for Carlsberg. Slagter finished thirty-ninth and our Quintana fifty-first.

Pos	Rider	Team	Time
1	Silvio Herklotz	Team Puma - SAP	8h28'03
39	Tom Jelte Slagter	Minions	+ 22'01
51	Dayer Quintana	Minions	+ 22'52
59	Nathan Brown	Minions	s.t.
118	Yannis Voisard	Minions	+ 43'15
151	Laurens Sweeck	Minions	+ 58'35
169	Leandro Marcos	Minions	+ 1h06'56
177	Mathias De Witte	Minions	+ 1h14'53

Rating:

Roma Maxima

Another cobblestone race, but it will be the last one for a long while. Young Alexander sacrificed himself for the breakaway, while De Witte and Sweeck later attacked to make it three. This master plan was not so master as it did not result in a very good result for any of them. By not attacking, Bolivar finished sixteenth which is a very good result for us on this awful surface.

Pos	Rider	Team	Time
1	Lukasz Wisniowski	Aker - MOT	4h25'32
16	Isaac Bolivar	Minions	+ 1'46
36	Mathias De Witte	Minions	+ 2'23
45	Leandro Marcos	Minions	+ 3'36
51	Laurens Sweeck	Minions	+ 4'07
103	Nathan Alexander	Minions	+ 8'32
144	Yannis Voisard	Minions	+ 13'59
179	Dayer Quintana	Minions	+ 23'46

Rating:

Veenendaal - Veenendaal

Our best result here is Drapac, who finished sixth all the way back in 2017. Now that we have a superstar and green jersey winner in Ahlstrand we aim to at the very least beat that, but I've promised the entire city a victory so I can't back down now. As always the sprint was messy, the breakaway almost surviving, but Ahlstrand was one of it not the fastest. Sadly being the fastest is not always guaranteed a trip to the podium, as was the case here. The Swede finished fifth, our best result ever, but I'm still the town's fool.

Pos	Rider	Team	Time
1	Goran Antonijevic	cycleYorkshire	4h31'40
5	Jonas Ahlstrand	Minions	s.t.
44	Rudy Barbier	Minions	s.t.
89	Alvaro Hodeg	Minions	+ 1'27
96	Janis Dakteris	Minions	s.t.
153	Nathan Alexander	Minions	+ 3'27
172	Cristian Perez	Minions	s.t.
173	Laurens Sweeck	Minions	s.t.
185	Yannis Voisard	Minions	+ 6'14

Rating:

Amstel Gold Race

The Ardennes triplet starts in the hilliest part of the Netherlands. Kinoshita's time to shine is here. Finishing in the front group was an easy feat for the Japanese, but he opened his sprint too soon and dropped down to eleventh. Such a result is simply not good enough with the team in these circumstances and we hope this motivates him for a better Belgian part of the triplet.

Pos	Rider	Team	Time
1	Yevgeniy Gidich	King Power	6h12'01
11	Tomohiro Kinoshita	Minions	s.t.
63	Nathan Alexander	Minions	+ 3'27
122	Dayer Quintana	Minions	+ 5'27
130	Leandro Marcos	Minions	s.t.
143	Laurens Sweeck	Minions	s.t.
154	Tom Jelte Slagter	Minions	s.t.
168	Cristian Perez	Minions	+ 7'47
176	Yannis Voisard	Minions	+ 8'54

Rating:

Rankings

These performances have not been good enough to get us away from the laterne rouge. The gap to a safe seventeenth place has even increased, and this has been our best month since January. Hope in Kinoshita is all we have left. Ahlstrand's performances make him our highest scoring rider just outside the individual top 30.

Pos	Last		Team	Total	RD	PpRD	Proj
1	2		Aker - MOT	3940	84	46.9	8442
2	1		EA Vesuvio	3692	81	45.58	8204
3	14		Gazelle	3343	86	38.87	6997
4	5		Polar	3327	81	41.07	7393
5	8		Carlsberg - Danske Bank	3195	84	38.04	6847
6	3		Cedevita	3136	81	38.72	6970
7	12		Amaysim Australia.com	3076	91	33.8	6084
8	7		Team Puma - SAP	2989	89	33.58	6044
9	6		Evonik - ELKO	2983	83	35.94	6469
10	9		Tinkoff - La Datcha Team	2950	84	35.12	6322
11	10		ELCO - ABEA	2821	84	33.58	6044
12	17		cycleYorkshire	2797	81	34.53	6215
13	4		MOL Cycling Team	2711	91	29.79	5362
14	13		King Power	2646	80	33.08	5954
15	15		ZARA - Irizar	2535	87	29.14	5245
16	11		Grieg-Maersk	2522	84	30.02	5404
17	18		Moser - Sygic	2506	77	32.55	5859
18	16		Lidl Cycling	2501	82	30.5	5490
19	19		Rabobank	2303	80	28.79	5182
20	20		ISA - Hexacta	2285	76	30.07	5413
21	21		Binance	1949	86	22.66	4079
22	22		Minions	1803	81	22.26	4007

Pos	Last	Rider	Nat		Team	Total Points
1	12	Joseph Dombrowski	USA		Gazelle	1518
32	160	Jonas Ahlstrand	SWD		Minions	447
64	51	Tomohiro Kinoshita	JPN		Minions	254
83	61	Mikkel Bjerg	DEN		Minions	180
172	441	Andris Vosekalns	LAT		Minions	87
178	146	Rohan Dennis	AUS		Minions	85
180	122	Mattia Cattaneo	ITA		Minions	84
197	167	Laurens Sweeck	BEL		Minions	76
231	263	Isaac Bolivar	COL		Minions	65
255	173	Dusan Kalaba	SER		Minions	59
264	256	Leandro Marcos	CUB		Minions	57
268	267	Cristian Perez	CUB		Minions	56
320	293	Mathias De Witte	BEL		Minions	47
321	310	Nathan Alexander	TRI		Minions	47
356	352	Tom Jelte Slagter	NED		Minions	42
363	319	Dayer Quintana	COL		Minions	41
376	292	Janis Dakteris	LAT		Minions	40
377	374	Yannis Voisard	SWI		Minions	40
444	373	Nathan Brown	USA		Minions	30
459	375	Rudy Barbier	FRA		Minions	27
470	485	Einer Augusto Rubio	COL		Minions	21
488	427	Alvaro Hodeg	COL		Minions	18

May the luck be with us this month, because we're gonna need it to get away from the bottom. The month of May contains the Vuelta, our on paper weakest GT, and Liege - Bastogne - Liege, our most anticipated monument.

Fleche Wallonne

The second leg of the Ardennes triplet, and Kinoshita needs an improvement over his eleventh place in the Amstel Gold Race in order to keep any hope of survival alive. He launched the first attack on the final punch on the Mur de Huy, but the attack was too early and everyone else jumped out of his slipstream. His final finishing position: twelfth. Even worse than AGR.

Pos	Rider	Team	Time
1	Miguel Angel Lopez	Evonik - ELKO	4h31'58
12	Tomohiro Kinoshita	Minions	+ 17
35	Dayer Quintana	Minions	+ 1'05
36	Tom Jelte Slagter	Minions	s.t.
44	Nathan Alexander	Minions	s.t.
102	Leandro Marcos	Minions	+ 2'04
132	Yannis Voisard	Minions	+ 3'07
143	Laurens Sweeck	Minions	+ 3'48
191	Cristian Perez	Minions	+ 9'54

Rating:

Liege - Bastogne - Liege

The final race is the most important one, a monument of cycling. Kinoshita is the defending champion so obviously expectations and attention is high. The Japanese was in the chasing group in the final phase, and the group caught the last attacker Skujins on the line. Kinoshita rolled over the line in sixth place, which is his best result of this Ardennes campaign and a fine result in itself, but in the context of the season it is not enough.

Pos	Rider	Team	Time
1	Sean De Bie	Lidl Cycling	5h55'01
6	Tomohiro Kinoshita	Minions	s.t.
71	Dayer Quintana	Minions	+ 5'10
81	Nathan Alexander	Minions	s.t.
130	Tom Jelte Slagter	Minions	+ 6'16
135	Yannis Voisard	Minions	+ 7'33
168	Laurens Sweeck	Minions	+ 10'33
169	Leandro Marcos	Minions	s.t.
189	Cristian Perez	Minions	+ 16'57

Rating:

Vuelta a Espana

The second Grand Tour of the season is arguably our least important one. With no GC ace or elite sprinter, there are opportunities for the secondary leaders to shine. Vosekalns can hunt for the KoM like in the Giro and Hodeg will have the rare opportunity of sprint leadership. The Colombian started off strong with a second place on the second stage and a fourth place on the third stage. Other highlights in the first week were Marcos appearing in two breakaways and the team not finishing last in the team time trial.



On the first true mountain stage we went on a mission by sending four riders in the breakaway: Marcos, Rubio, Voisard and Vosekalns. The first three set the pace and the latter picked up the mountain points where they were available, landing him the jersey at the end of the day. The pace also meant the breakaway survived, with the Latvian only losing out to Preidler on the final climb for the stage win. Rubio finished in seventh and Voisard in ninth for some great results for these youngsters. Vosekalns and Rubio also occupied second and fifth in the GC at this point, and a huge lead in the teams classification. We wish the race stopped here, but we're barely halfway. Vosekalns would lose the jersey the next day, but gain it back the day after. He would lose it again after stage fourteen despite going into the breakaway. By now, our riders had dropped way back in the GC and the dream of the teams classification was long shattered.



Hodeg had to give a lot to get over the mountains which impacted his sprinting performances, never getting a top ten outside of the first two opportunities until stage sixteen, where he finished as runner-up to Demare. Vosekalns tried desperately to pick up mountain points but Formolo and Warchol would pick up most of the treasure, the Latvian getting breadcrumbs if he got anything at all. Even assists from Rubio and Slagter did not help.



At the end of the race, Vosekalns finished in forty-first place overall, and fifth in the mountains classification. Rubio took seventh in the young riders classification for some extra points. Overall we can't say the race was bad, but it also wasn't that good. The low expectations were met, but taking a trophy of some sort home would have been nice.

Pos	Rider	Team	Time
1	Silvio Herklotz	Team Puma - SAP	81h03'32
41	Andris Vosekalns	Minions	+ 1h01'15
63	Einer Augusto Rubio	Minions	+ 1h19'10
67	Dayer Quintana	Minions	+ 1h21'02
75	Tom Jelte Slagter	Minions	+ 1h25'36
120	Yannis Voisard	Minions	+ 2h13'40
162	Leandro Marcos	Minions	+ 3h43'43
172	Laurens Sweeck	Minions	+ 4h11'37
184	Alvaro Hodeg	Minions	+ 5h04'24

Rating:

Rund um Koln

Ahlstand is our leader in what is supposed to be a sprint towards the finish line. It did not turn out that way, with Wisniowski winning from a late attack. The Swede finished thirteenth, which would have been seventh at best if there were no late attacks.

Pos	Rider	Team	Time
1	Lukasz Wisniowski	Aker - MOT	4h39'18
13	Jonas Ahlstrand	Minions	+ 28
114	Nathan Alexander	Minions	s.t.
119	Mathias De Witte	Minions	s.t.
122	Nathan Brown	Minions	s.t.
129	Isaac Bolivar	Minions	s.t.
156	Janis Dakteris	Minions	+ 5'16
158	Rudy Barbier	Minions	s.t.
163	Cristian Perez	Minions	s.t.

Rating:

Tour of Lithuania

The defining two stages in the Tour of Lithuania are a team time trial and a hilly stage. We'll try to drag Kinoshita with us in the team event, but still have Cattaneo as back-up in case he goes overboard. First there were two flat stages in which Kalaba finished fourth and ninth respectively. The team time trial went well for the first five finishers, who conceded seventeen seconds to winners Grieg with a seventh place. Unfortunately Kinoshita was not amongst them, the Japanese losing an additional minute. A second place on the final stage was a great result, and eighth in the GC is not too bad, but taking away that minute would have seen him finish second.

Pos	Rider	Team	Time
1	Tom Wirtgen	EA Vesuvio	13h09'23
8	Tomohiro Kinoshita	Minions	+ 1'02
37	Rohan Dennis	Minions	+ 4'34
38	Mattia Cattaneo	Minions	s.t.
40	Nathan Brown	Minions	+ 4'36
46	Dusan Kalaba	Minions	+ 4'51
50	Nathan Alexander	Minions	+ 5'01
84	Mikkel Bjerg	Minions	+ 6'31
109	Cristian Perez	Minions	+ 8'04

Rating:

Rankings

Even though our months wasn't particularly great, our nearest rival Binance had an even worse month, meaning we are no longer in last place! Instead we're second from last, a long way from safety, but still: not last! Kinoshita has overtaken Ahlstrand in the individual rankings, but neither leader has made it into the top thirty overall.

Pos	Last		Team	Total	RD	PpRD	Proj
1	1		Aker - MOT	5391	115	46.88	8438
2	2		EA Vesuvio	4737	112	42.29	7612
3	8		Team Puma - SAP	4648	116	40.07	7213
4	3		Gazelle	4439	119	37.3	6714
5	10		Tinkoff - La Datcha Team	4207	115	36.58	6584
6	4		Polar	4127	108	38.21	6878
7	9		Evonik - ELKO	4005	116	34.53	6215
8	17		Moser - Sygic	3768	108	34.89	6280
9	6		Cedevita	3707	108	34.32	6178
10	12		cycleYorkshire	3705	108	34.31	6176
11	5		Carlsberg - Danske Bank	3688	111	33.23	5981
12	7		Amaysim Australia.com	3660	120	30.5	5490
13	14		King Power	3627	111	32.68	5882
14	15		ZARA - Irizar	3598	116	31.02	5584
15	13		MOL Cycling Team	3449	120	28.74	5173
16	19		Rabobank	3366	111	30.32	5458
17	18		Lidl Cycling	3364	111	30.31	5456
18	11		ELCO - ABEA	3321	115	28.88	5198
19	16		Grieg-Maersk	3245	115	28.22	5080
20	20		ISA - Hexacta	2980	107	27.85	5013
21	22		Minions	2595	112	23.17	4171
22	21		Binance	2533	115	22.03	3965

Pos	Last	Rider	Nat		Team	Total Points
1	31	Silvio Herklotz	GER		Team Puma - SAP	1694
40	64	Tomohiro Kinoshita	JPN		Minions	506
46	32	Jonas Ahlstrand	SWD		Minions	482
92	172	Andris Vosekalns	LAT		Minions	225
108	83	Mikkel Bjerg	DEN		Minions	184
152	488	Alvaro Hodeg	COL		Minions	125
208	197	Laurens Sweeck	BEL		Minions	94
210	178	Rohan Dennis	AUS		Minions	93
213	180	Mattia Cattaneo	ITA		Minions	92
255	321	Nathan Alexander	TRI		Minions	76
260	264	Leandro Marcos	CUB		Minions	75
270	255	Dusan Kalaba	SER		Minions	73
276	356	Tom Jelte Slagter	NED		Minions	72
283	268	Cristian Perez	CUB		Minions	71
284	363	Dayer Quintana	COL		Minions	71
286	231	Isaac Bolivar	COL		Minions	70
336	377	Yannis Voisard	SWI		Minions	60
373	470	Einer Augusto Rubio	COL		Minions	54
383	320	Mathias De Witte	BEL		Minions	52
420	376	Janis Dakteris	LAT		Minions	45
430	444	Nathan Brown	USA		Minions	43
480	459	Rudy Barbier	FRA		Minions	32

We did not give a June update, because we only raced in two races and there were no rankings posted at the end of the month. We merge the update with July which also contains just two races, but does include the biggest of them all: the Tour de France. We do have a ranking update at the end to see if we have hope of a second season in the ProTour.

Tour de Suisse

June kicks off in Switzerland, bringing a rider trio which will feature multiple time these two months: Cattaneo for the GC, Kalaba for the sprints and Bjerg for the time trials. The Serbian had four good opportunities in the first four stages but only finished in the top ten once, eighth on stage four. Cattaneo lost two minutes on the climb on stage five, which he needed to recover on the next time trial. The Italian finished ninth, gaining time on all his direct rivals and climbing to seventh in the GC. But he was not our best finisher on the stage, as that honor goes to Bjerg. The Dane not only beat him fair and square but also beat everyone else to win the stage! The final stage yielded no major changes, so the Italian took that seventh place home.

Pos	Rider	Team	Time
1	Egan Bernal	Polar	28h17'09
7	Mattia Cattaneo	Minions	+ 4'11
26	Nathan Brown	Minions	+ 14'41
31	Dayer Quintana	Minions	+ 15'12
39	Einer Augusto Rubio	Minions	+ 17'02
56	Andris Vosekalns	Minions	+ 21'50
101	Mikkel Bjerg	Minions	+ 42'45
107	Dusan Kalaba	Minions	+ 45'11
DNF	Rudy Barbier	Minions

Rating:

Scandinavia Open Road Race

A hillclimb against the clock followed by two hilly stages. This is Kinoshita's territory and if not the Japanese, Dennis also stands a decent chance if the hilly stages are too easy. But on the prologue it was Brown with the best finishing position of tenth, ahead of Dennis in thirteenth and Kinoshita in at a deficit of over thirty seconds. Stage two, Kinoshita participated in the sprint and finished eleventh, but more importantly the American and Australian stayed within the first group. Stage three was considerably more difficult and not even Kinoshita finished in the front group. Brown and Dennis finished even further behind and almost or completely dropped out of the top 100. Kinoshita in 34th emerged victorious in the inter-team battle, but overall this is a huge letdown.

Pos	Rider	Team	Time
1	Silvio Herklotz	Team Puma - SAP	9h34'5
34	Tomohiro Kinoshita	Minions	+ 2'52
72	Nathan Alexander	Minions	+ 6'34
76	Tom Jelte Slagter	Minions	+ 6'49
91	Nathan Brown	Minions	+ 7'34
109	Rohan Dennis	Minions	+ 8'37
133	Yannis Voisard	Minions	+ 10'56
141	Dayer Quintana	Minions	+ 11'30
180	Leandro Marcos	Minions	+ 28'11

Rating:

Tour de France

July is time for the big one. La Grande Boucle. The Tour de France. Our goals are a top ten for Cattaneo against a very strong field, and some strong sprints from Kalaba. On the first day the latter already left his mark and crossed the line first on Mont des Alouettes, winning the first stage and taking yellow, green and the polka dots! We could not have wished for a better start and this is perhaps the greatest moment in our history, wearing the iconic yellow jersey, even if just for a day. The Serbian lost the jersey on the next day by only finishing sixteenth, but kept the polka dots for two more days due to the lack of hills. He also added two fourth places, a seventh and a eighth place in his next sprints, almost getting into bonus seconds and reclaiming the jersey. That would have been huge, but at least we have the memories and pictures.



Towards the Pyrenees, youngster Alexander went into the breakaway on stage seven, a nice moment for the Trinidadian loanee from Podium Ambition. In his mission to take the polka dots jersey he climbed up to fourth in the rankings with his performances in the first few mountain stages. Rubio also attempted a breakaway but without tangible results. Over in the GC battle, Cattaneo consistently finished behind the group of other favorites, losing a few seconds here and there which gave him a deficit in the GC. Kalaba sprinted to sixth in a stage including the Col d’Aubisque, and the first flat stage after the Pyrenees he finished fifth. The time trial is where Cattaneo gained back the time lost on the mountain stages, but it was Bjerg who had a better time and finished in third place, only behind the legend Phinney and Mano.



Onto the Alps with a breakaway attempts from Slagter and Rubio and more time loss for Cattaneo. Heading into stage nineteen towards Semnoz he was thirteenth in the GC, fifteen minutes behind Lecuisinier. With a time trial still to come we had hopes to get into that top ten but nothing more unless we did something radical. The radical plan was to send the Italian into the breakaway with Slagter as support, kinda like Shikai's heroic Giro win. The favorites were smart enough to keep the gap manageable but the breakaway did stay away until the end, with Warchol winning the sprint to the finish line with Cattaneo just behind. The Italian was still thirteenth, now at fourteen minutes from yellow but the riders directly above him were much closer. On the long time trial the Italian took the hot seat and watched one rider after another fail to reach his time and more importantly, fall behind him in the GC. Only Phinney (obviously) beat his time, and he was up to eighth in the general classification! On the Champs-Elysees, Kalaba picked the wrong wheel and did not finish where he started, with a win but with only a fifteenth place.



In conclusion, the Tour de France has been a wonderful experience with some wonderful memories. A stage win, a day in yellow, a few other souvenirs and an eighth place in the general classification. This could have even been seventh since Cattaneo lost out to Hirt by less than ten seconds, which could have easily been improved somewhere on a mountain stage. But this does not sour our feelings, in a season where more has gone against us than in favor, at least we can think of the biggest race (and all other Grand Tours) fondly. Eve if we likely won't be back next year, we learned valuable things and will be back one day.

Pos	Rider	Team	Time
1	Pierre-Henri Lecuisinier	Evonik - ELKO	84h07'29
8	Mattia Cattaneo	Minions	+ 13'28
59	Tom Jelte Slagter	Minions	+ 1h20'02
90	Nathan Brown	Minions	+ 1h44'46
104	Einer Augusto Rubio	Minions	+ 2h02'41
116	Nathan Alexander	Minions	+ 2h32'33
127	Yannis Voisard	Minions	+ 2h52'28
139	Dusan Kalaba	Minions	+ 3h25'25
155	Mikkel Bjerg	Minions	+ 4h00'24

Rating:

Tour of Slovenia

There's little time to rest for the squad as the Tour of Slovenia comes only a few days after the Tour. Fatigue for Kalaba might have been a factor in his only sprinting opportunity, not finishing in the top ten. For Cattaneo it was a case of surviving in the TTT and hilly stages, and flaming on the final long time trial. In the team event we finished a decent ninth at 24 seconds to the winners. Stage three was successfully survived and stage four was even more successfully survived with a fourth place finish in the front group. Heading into the final stage Cattaneo was fifth but the riders above him are all top caliber against the clock, and Würtz and Dunbar are very close behind. The calculations were right, a twenty-first place was slightly disappointing, finishing behind those ahead of him and losing out to the aforementioned two.

Pos	Rider	Team	Time
1	Tom Wirtgen	EA Vesuvio	13h22'14
7	Mattia Cattaneo	Minions	+ 1'23
37	Rohan Dennis	Minions	+ 5'02
40	Nathan Brown	Minions	+ 5'11
47	Mikkel Bjerg	Minions	+ 5'32
70	Nathan Alexander	Minions	+ 6'42
75	Dayer Quintana	Minions	+ 7'02
87	Dusan Kalaba	Minions	+ 7'48
109	Cristian Perez	Minions	+ 9'16

Rating:

Rankings

Despite being the ninth best scoring team in Le Tour, we did not gain any position and remain second from bottom. We have managed to put a considerable gap between ourselves and Binance at the bottom of the rankings, and are still within touching distance of ISA and ELCO. The gap to the first safe position is over 500 points though, which will be a tough act to recover from. Over in the individual standings, Cattaneo's TDF top ten sees him take the lead in our little competition, but Kinoshita and Ahlstrand are close behind with all three of them having race days left. Kalaba is our only other rider inside the top 100.

Pos	Last		Team	Total	RD	PpRD	Proj
1	7		Evonik - ELKO	6246	151	41.36	7445
2	1		Aker - MOT	6124	146	41.95	7551
3	6		Polar	6070	153	39.67	7141
4	2		EA Vesuvio	5917	148	39.98	7196
5	3		Team Puma - SAP	5851	154	37.99	6838
6	9		Cedevita	5727	153	37.43	6737
7	4		Gazelle	5647	149	37.9	6822
8	5		Tinkoff - La Datcha Team	5362	146	36.73	6611
9	15		MOL Cycling Team	5324	157	33.91	6104
10	10		cycleYorkshire	5252	153	34.33	6179
11	17		Lidl Cycling	4809	153	31.43	5657
12	11		Carlsberg - Danske Bank	4788	151	31.71	5708
13	13		King Power	4561	146	31.24	5623
14	8		Moser - Sygic	4442	148	30.01	5402
15	12		Amaysim Australia.com	4413	157	28.11	5060
16	14		ZARA - Irizar	4308	156	27.62	4972
17	16		Rabobank	4189	146	28.69	5164
18	19		Grieg-Maersk	4123	146	28.24	5083
19	20		ISA - Hexacta	3914	145	26.99	4858
20	18		ELCO - ABEA	3839	146	26.29	4732
21	21		Minions	3638	148	24.58	4424
22	22		Binance	3371	154	21.89	3940

Pos	Last	Rider	Nat		Team	Total Points
1	41	Pierre-Henri Lecuisinier	FRA		Evonik - ELKO	2117
48	213	Mattia Cattaneo	ITA		Minions	574
54	40	Tomohiro Kinoshita	JPN		Minions	521
65	46	Jonas Ahlstrand	SWD		Minions	482
78	270	Dusan Kalaba	SER		Minions	364
102	108	Mikkel Bjerg	DEN		Minions	271
119	92	Andris Vosekalns	LAT		Minions	227
193	152	Alvaro Hodeg	COL		Minions	125
241	210	Rohan Dennis	AUS		Minions	106
264	276	Tom Jelte Slagter	NED		Minions	97
270	208	Laurens Sweeck	BEL		Minions	94
271	255	Nathan Alexander	TRI		Minions	94
275	430	Nathan Brown	USA		Minions	92
282	284	Dayer Quintana	COL		Minions	90
315	260	Leandro Marcos	CUB		Minions	80
330	373	Einer Augusto Rubio	COL		Minions	76
333	336	Yannis Voisard	SWI		Minions	75
351	283	Cristian Perez	CUB		Minions	71
357	286	Isaac Bolivar	COL		Minions	70
438	383	Mathias De Witte	BEL		Minions	52
458	420	Janis Dakteris	LAT		Minions	45
488	480	Rudy Barbier	FRA		Minions	32

As the season nears the end we look back at what August brought us. Four races, three classics and a stage race, and the little bit of hope that win every single one of them and climb up from the second-last position.

Deutschland Tour

Germany brings a flat race with four stages for the sprinters and a decisive GC stage for the time trialists. Ahlstrand targets the former while Bjerg targets the latter, being a virtual shoe-in for the young rider classification. The Swede started off well with a fifth place on the opening stage, but in the next two sprinter stages he finished outside the top ten. On the final stage he found a better position in fourth. We glossed over the time trial at the midpoint for now but I don't want to remember that disaster. Dennis finished at 50 seconds from winner Würtz which seems expected, but Bjerg riding the same time and not even coming close to the white jersey is unforgivable.

Pos	Rider	Team	Time
1	Mads Würtz	Grieg-Maersk	18h38'50
46	Rohan Dennis	Minions	+ 50
47	Mikkel Bjerg	Minions	s.t.
71	Nathan Brown	Minions	+ 1'08
87	Cristian Perez	Minions	+ 1'19
125	Jonas Ahlstrand	Minions	+ 2'17
155	Janis Dakteris	Minions	+ 3'25
171	Rudy Barbier	Minions	+ 3'55
184	Alvaro Hodeg	Minions	+ 5'44

Rating:

Clasica San Sebastian

Over to San Sebastian for a PTHC race with a lot of hills. Kinoshita is obviously one of the favorites here and the entire team rode for him to be in the best possible position towards the end of the race. At about 25 kilometers to go he made a move but was chased back by the other favorites. A bit later outsider Arndt went and he was not chase back, and crossed the finish line to win the race. Schmid won the sprint from the chasing group and just beat Kinoshita, but we have a podium finish for the Japanese. This was far from the worst race of the season.

Pos	Rider	Team	Time
1	Nikias Arndt	DuckDuckGo - Everesting	5h19'15
3	Tomohiro Kinoshita	Minions	+ 17
46	Dayer Quintana	Minions	+ 2'54
55	Tom Jelte Slagter	Minions	+ 4'37
108	Yannis Voisard	Minions	+ 7'17
127	Nathan Alexander	Minions	+ 9'30
155	Cristian Perez	Minions	+ 13'12
159	Leandro Marcos	Minions	+ 13'39
181	Isaac Bolivar	Minions	+ 21'21

Rating:

Chrono des Herbiers

The traditional race against the clock in France. Bjerg is our best time trialist and the only one of our three starters who might score a decent result, but everyone who has some skill against the clock was here so the young Dane finished in 26th. He'll have many bright years ahead to beat this result.

Pos	Rider	Team	Time
1	Mads Würtz	Grieg-Maersk	54'41
26	Mikkel Bjerg	Minions	+ 1'12
45	Nathan Brown	Minions	+ 1'42
55	Cristian Perez	Minions	+ 2'02

Rating:

East Midlands Cicle Classic

The roads in the East Midlands are very bad, which doesn't give us much hope of a good result. The best we can hope is some camera time in the breakaway. In the end we were represented with two riders: Bolivar and Dakteris. Obviously they stood no chance when the favorites blasted by. De Witte was our best finisher in 36th.

Pos	Rider	Team	Time
1	Lukasz Wisniowski	Aker - MOT	4h42'38
36	Mathias De Witte	Minions	+ 6'57
47	Laurens Sweeck	Minions	s.t.
49	Isaac Bolivar	Minions	s.t.
70	Leandro Marcos	Minions	+ 10'20
85	Janis Dakteris	Minions	+ 14'56
109	Cristian Perez	Minions	+ 23'32
153	Nathan Alexander	Minions	+ 50'45
161	Yannis Voisard	Minions	+ 59'54

Rating:

Rankings

We outscored our three direct rivals ISA, ELCO and Binance but not by huge margins, so everything else at the bottom stays the same. We might be able to climb two spots if we nail the final two months, but above that it will be very, very difficult. Kinoshita has overtaken Cattaneo again to become our highest scoring rider, which he should given his wage.

Pos	Last		Team	Total	RD	PpRD	Proj
1	3		Polar	6600	167	39.52	7114
2	4		EA Vesuvio	6494	159	40.84	7351
3	2		Aker - MOT	6460	155	41.68	7502
4	1		Evonik - ELKO	6413	157	40.85	7353
5	6		Cedevita	6227	167	37.29	6712
6	5		Team Puma - SAP	6185	165	37.48	6746
7	8		Tinkoff - La Datcha Team	5887	155	37.98	6836
8	7		Gazelle	5770	153	37.71	6788
9	9		MOL Cycling Team	5657	163	34.71	6248
10	10		cycleYorkshire	5644	167	33.8	6084
11	12		Carlsberg - Danske Bank	5119	163	31.4	5652
12	11		Lidl Cycling	4949	165	29.99	5398
13	18		Grieg-Maersk	4832	155	31.17	5611
14	13		King Power	4827	153	31.55	5679
15	14		Moser - Sygic	4696	157	29.91	5384
16	15		Amaysim Australia.com	4573	163	28.06	5051
17	16		ZARA - Irizar	4452	167	26.66	4799
18	17		Rabobank	4439	153	29.01	5222
19	19		ISA - Hexacta	4099	157	26.11	4700
20	20		ELCO - ABEA	4034	155	26.03	4685
21	21		Minions	3875	159	24.37	4387
22	22		Binance	3509	161	21.8	3924

Pos	Last	Rider	Nat		Team	Total Points
1	2	Taylor Phinney	USA		MOL Cycling Team	2277
49	54	Tomohiro Kinoshita	JPN		Minions	621
55	48	Mattia Cattaneo	ITA		Minions	574
66	65	Jonas Ahlstrand	SWD		Minions	498
79	78	Dusan Kalaba	SER		Minions	364
99	102	Mikkel Bjerg	DEN		Minions	301
125	119	Andris Vosekalns	LAT		Minions	227
209	193	Alvaro Hodeg	COL		Minions	125
237	241	Rohan Dennis	AUS		Minions	115
252	275	Nathan Brown	USA		Minions	107
259	270	Laurens Sweeck	BEL		Minions	104
271	271	Nathan Alexander	TRI		Minions	99
282	264	Tom Jelte Slagter	NED		Minions	97
290	282	Dayer Quintana	COL		Minions	92
308	351	Cristian Perez	CUB		Minions	86
318	315	Leandro Marcos	CUB		Minions	85
336	333	Yannis Voisard	SWI		Minions	80
337	357	Isaac Bolivar	COL		Minions	80
349	330	Einer Augusto Rubio	COL		Minions	76
408	438	Mathias De Witte	BEL		Minions	62
455	458	Janis Dakteris	LAT		Minions	50
490	488	Rudy Barbier	FRA		Minions	32