Here we are, the final focus race of the year is upon us - Vuelta a Colombia, an 11-day stage race of the lowest category. But given it was a goal race, we lined up pretty much the best team we could - and it seemed to pay off: the preview saw three of our riders among the Top 8 climbers! Given how the season had gone until now, we still were pretty conservative with our goals, setting the bar at Top 5 GC - most likely by home rider Juan Chamorro, who was listed as 2nd strongest climber - and Top 3 in the team standings.
Futhermore, our junior team was present as well - we just expected them to be present in the breakaways from time to time.
The takeoff was as good as it could have been, as we won the opening TTT! However, for some reason team leader Chamorro was dropped and lost about 90" on day 1 - definitely a horrible start for him personally.
In the first tough stage, it looked like the team had picked Javier Gomez as their new leader, and he managed to keep a Top 10 position for some days.
However, all of a sudden they changed minds and now supported Chamorro, who was already far, far behind by that time. Meaning that Gomez dropped down the rankings, and Chamorro rose some positions. But having no-one even in the Top 10 before the final days was worse than any horror scenario we'd have thought of!
Unfortunately, it didn't get any better in the end. Gomez lost some more positions, and Chamorro didn't gain any - meaning that despite having three potential Top 10 riders, our best GC result was 13th... An unacceptable showing by the boys, and one that will definitely have some consequences come renewals!
Winning the closing TT - and even having some more riders in the Top 10 that day was a really small consolation, as the big points were really, really far away due to the complete failure of all our potential leaders in at least one mountain stage.
In the end, the result we were most happy about was Germán Ollero's 5th place in the KoM standings - our greatest talent showed a lot of engagement, getting into the breakaway on most mountain stages, showing great fighting spirit. That's the way to go, boys!!!
We'll now have to analyze the entire season and draw conclusions for next year. One thing that's already obvious, though, is that we didn't perform well in the longest stage races - pretty much the worst possible scenario. So expect to see us in more of the shorter races next year - although the sponsors definitely wouldn't be happy to see us skipping Venezuela and Colombia!
"Are we done yet?" asks man in charge of making sure the thing gets done
The Santos-Euskadi team boss has finally been located after my months-long search, involving a largely jetski-based scouring of the North Sea, five weeks being guided by Lafar Majka and his wolf family through the Carpathian Mountains, and an unforgettable week at Burning Man I can't remember any of. Finally someone from the website rang me, saying she had heard where he was. Turns out he was in Spain.
"Oh is the season over?" he calls to me across the beach as I approach him. I answer in the negative. "Then why the f*** are you talking to me? Leave me alone!" he shouts, before returning to his largely unclothed gang of partiers, and ingesting what must have been far more than the vodka bottle he was holding termed "a moderate serving".
As I was getting into my car after that, not to drive away but to break down in tears at the futility of my last seven month's work, I heard a thudding noise against the window. It was him, looking far worse for wear and much sadder.
"I'm sorry for how I treated you, bambino. This year has been tough for us - tougher than 2018, even. The crashes in the big races, and Suntory still being allowed in the U23 division..."
"Why wouldn't Suntory be allowed in the U23 divis-"
"That's not the point, Anthony."
"My name is-"
"I really do want to be closer to you Jeff. The press. I have been away too long. The people need to-
"You forgot that you need to give 10 press statements each year or you won't get your full budget?" I asked wisely. He nodded with a sad smile.
"You understand me. Thank you. I will be seeing you again soon, Greg. And please give Loic a kiss from me."
"I'm not sure I sh-"
"On the mouth, Murray. Thank you. Thank you."
And with that, the great enigma had vanished. Well, he seemed to be dealing with relegation well this time - he hadn't kidnapped and tortured his star climber only to replace him with a long-lost twin who could only communicate with wolfish howls - yet. Though Peiffer was sniffing me a bit at the Lombardia pre-race interview...
A cobbled classic and four stage races here, with a miniGT. High expetation from Kigali GP, while Talansky is facing his busiest month with 18 race days, Hofland still looking for first win of the season at Juarez.
Int. Österreich-Rundfahrt Engeldinger ends stably inside top10 in mountain stages, with a second place in 3rd stage, this consistency will worth just an 8th place in GC, far from the podium. Nothing more to add in this anonymous race for us if it wasn't Monfort joining breaks in stage 2 and 6.
Kigali GP
It is immediately clear that the race will be again a Phinney vs Senechal affair. The team prepare perfectly the ground and in the end the french rival is in numerical inferiority, with Taylor ending the job in a face-to-face last lap. Behind, without working responsibility, Declercq keeps last podium place with Broeckx and Stuyven 5th and 7th. Perfect day for us.
Volta a Portugal  Talansky wins the prologue (again), but he loses the lead already in second stage thanks to a finisseur move, and then another position in first mountain stage. In the mid tour, we catch a couple of podiums, with Hofland 2nd and Talansky 3rd in a reduced bunch sprint.
Last mountain top finish brings Andrew back in 2nd place for 2 mere seconds, ahead of the last TT. A poor performance in the second last day relegates again Talansky in 3rd place.
Very disappointed from second tier riders who didn't join a single breakaway, the first stage win and last day cerimony were the only two occasions where we showed our jersey in almost two weeks of races. 3rd place in GC is anyway a good result. Hofland quite blank again.
Tour of Vancouver Talansky wins the prologue (..and again), but this time he is able to maintain the lead for 3 stages. Unfortunately he sinks with the mountains, and falls to the 15th place in GC, before earning some ground in the last TT, 12th in the end. Nass joins stage 5 break, surviving in 8th position, while Zingle is the attacker of the day later with lesser luck.
Circulo de Juarez Hofland is inside the top10 in all stages, climbing to 3rd in points classification, but just 7th in GC. He is still waiting for first win of the season. No riders joined breakaways.
With continued rumors swirling about a power struggle between McRettin and his primary sponsor for control of the team, the consensus of the riders seems to be with McRettin.
We were able to catch a number of them outside the Burj Al Arab, in Dubai, where the team's end-of-year celebration weekend was in full swing.
Irish TT star Ryan Mullen observed that "when I was struggling midseason, Willie came to me and said 'McMullen, just feckin' ride your feckin' bike', he really simplified things for me.".
More testimony about McRettin came from Dominic Mapemba, "I don't really understand most of what he says, because of his accent , but the team support is always first class, he hires great people". While, veteran Sergion Henao commented that "I have always loved Willie, even when he was screwing me in salary negotiations".
Young Belgian, Leo Clinck, who we caught up with late on the second night of the party, refused to comment, but did launch into a stirring rendtion of Bette Middler's "Wind Beneath My Wings".
Former riders are invited to the party and even one of them came out in support of McRettin, with Yannick Eijssen telling us that "I may have spent more years at Filliers-Mora but Willie's team will always be the one I remember most fondly"
Finally, and most importantly we caught up with a member of team talisman Nairo Quintana's entourage, who gave us a one word answer to whether Quintana would resign with a McRettin-less KBC: "No".
Bucaramanga: Sagan finished 7th in this strong field of riders, another fine result. Allianz was insanely strong and launched a late attack for the overall WT podium, but BP managed to hold onto 3rd place in the rankings after all.
Paris-Tours: The race didn't prove as selective as we'd hoped and so Sagan's last World Cup race of the season was his weakest, he finished 20th. However, it was still a successful goal race because Cavendish was 3rd, only beaten by Van Poppel and Coquard. A good comeback after a disappointing Quebec Sprint Challenge.
Il Lombardia: In hindsight Majka probably shouldn't have followed the late attacks by Aru and Bardet which ended up going nowhere. He was without energy for a sprint in a group which had swollen to 16 riders and only finished 15th. However, Pöstlberger had a good race, he was 22nd.
World TTT: Our mediocre TTT team finished 17th, just like last year. Our second WT race of the season without points, after the Virginia TT Tour. It could be something to improve next season, but it's a fairly low priority.
Our third ICL season was yet another resounding success, we have been blessed with good fortune ever since we joined the competition. Our main goal this year was to increase our budget and we are confident we did very well in that regard: We finished 3rd overall in the WT teams ranking, all five focus races went well or even very well and Sagan retained the World Cup crown by an impressive margin.
Our other goal was to score more wins than last season, especially on the World Tour. And once again we did very well, 13 WT victories in 2020 compared to 3 in 2019: 5 by Majka, 4 by Sagan and one each by Cavendish, Simon, McCluskey and Cuming. Sagan's wins were especially precious, he won the E3 Prijs, the Lincoln GP and, of course, Paris-Roubaix. And then Cavendish wraps up the season in style and is crowned World Champion 2020. He thus completes his ICL medal set, after silver in 2016 and bronze in 2017.
Rider Scoring 2020
AVG
WT
CT
Total
RD
Pts/RD
Wage
Pts/W
Sagan
80.0
2436
393
2829
57
49.6
1915
1.48
Majka
80.7
1993
1993
48
41.5
1240
1.61
Cavendish
80.1
1361
1361
55
24.7
1125
1.21
Hart
76.7
759
759
60
12.7
505
1.50
Fernández
76.4
252
252
61
4.1
420
0.60
Simón
74.5
199
12
211
68
3.1
225
0.94
Dibben
76.0
147
11
158
63
2.5
350
0.45
Cano
74.6
128
128
67
1.9
245
0.52
Pöstlberger
74.9
54
73
127
66
1.9
250
0.51
Wagner
74.6
114
5
119
72
1.7
230
0.52
Birch
71.6
27
61
88
77
1.1
100
0.88
S. v. Winden
71.8
16
62
78
76
1.0
100
0.78
Stannard
76.3
55
20
75
62
1.2
410
0.18
Cuming
72.5
55
19
74
74
1.0
135
0.55
Hansen
72.6
38
30
68
74
0.9
130
0.52
Diederich
72.3
17
50
67
74
0.9
115
0.58
McCluskey
72.5
63
2
65
74
0.9
120
0.54
Christian
72.9
44
8
52
73
0.7
140
0.37
Garcia
73.3
7
38
45
71
0.6
150
0.30
Arndt
76.1
38
38
67
0.6
340
0.11
Guerin
74.4
28
28
68
0.4
210
0.13
Gao Lei
72.8
8
1
9
73
0.1
145
0.06
Meyer
72.7
8
8
73
0.1
130
0.06
D. v. Winden
72.2
8
8
75
0.1
110
0.07
Lowsley-W
72.6
2
2
74
0.0
120
0.02
Our star signing Peter Sagan performed even beyond our high expectations, many outstanding races and not a single underperformance. Rafal Majka also had a very good season, improving on his 2019 total. Cav's season wasn't as good as his fantastic 2019 with Suntory, but on par with our expectations. Tao Hart also scored significantly less points than the year before, but it was still another good season from him.
However, we lost depth scoring. Last season the riders outside the top 4 scorers collected 2074 WT points, this season it's only 1308. We expected this ahead of the season, so we aren't surprised, but still, Arndt and Stannard were disappointing.
Team Report
Peter Sagan: He won Paris-Roubaix! And he won our focus and home race, the Lincoln GP! And he won the World Cup competition by a huge margin! And that's just the tip of the iceberg. He didn't have a single bad race. Oh, sure, he threw away an Eneco Tour win and dropped to 3rd and he could have been smarter in the Ronde and placed better than 9th. But these are hardly bad results. An outstanding season by an outstanding rider.
Rafal Majka: Shouldered two of our focus races and did extremely well in both of them, finishing runner-up twice and winning three stages. He was then heading for a disappointing Tour de France until he launched a furious comeback on the final few stages and climbed onto the podium whilst also winning in Alpe d'Huez. Bravo! A slight shame that he lost Sochi with a bad ITT, we're still waiting to win a WT stage race.
Marc Cavendish: While his WT season wasn't as sparkling as the previous one, Cavendish still had a great positive impact on our season. After all, he performed very well in two of our focus races, he was 2nd in MSR and 3rd in Paris-Tours. Plus, of course, he crowned himself World Champion 2020.
Tao Hart: White jerseys in both Giro and Tour, making it a hat-trick with the Vuelta 2019. We're extremely proud. Solid results all year round, except for Guatemala maybe, but that's splitting hairs.
The Rest: Ruben Fernandez scored fewer points than last season (252 vs. 291), but I guess the competition has grown tougher. Simon and Dibben scored about 50 points more this year, which is nice for Simon but still not enough for Dibben. Our young-ish pot 6 riders Cano and Wagner didn't disappoint, Pöstlberger had a great Tour of Britain. All our British domestiques – except for Lowsley-Williams – scored at least 50 points.
An outlook beyond this season
While only one rider will leave us for sure – Dennis van Winden, who is retiring – we are only certain about keeping 16 of our 25 riders. 17 if you include Fritsch and Shelton, who will move up from our dev team, while Diederich will become the new U23 captain. On the chopping block are: Cavendish, Stannard, Fernandez, Arndt, Pöstlberger, Guerin, Garcia and Stefan van Winden.
There might be a way back for the two old Brits. Cav will be down to SPR 79/ACC 79 which still makes him a decent main sprinter, plus he'll be wearing the rainbow jersey. Stannard would be useful on his new min wage (180). Ruben and Arndt lose a point each of their core stat which means Simon and Wagner, who both improve, already fill their shoes. Pöstlberger has fantastic allround stats but we feel others can now compensate, the same goes for Guerin, Fritsch is a direct replacement. Garcia is only 25 years old and should still turn into a decent puncher, but he can't offer much support in the WT yet. Stefan van Winden is a great min wage rider, we might just keep him another year.
This is all dependent on the FA market, of course. We'd definitely need a new main sprinter, we also want a better puncheur than Garcia to support Sagan in the hilly classics. We might look into hiring a TT specialist or two to become more competitive in the rare time trials. Or we'll copy Sevilla and hire a bunch of climbers, maybe even look for a second stage racing captain next to Majka. Though there's also the option of training Tao Geoghegan Hart into that role instead.
WT Achievement of the year: Sagan winning Paris-Roubaix
Other Achievement of the year: World Champion Cavendish
Comeback of the year: Majka in the Tour de France
Disappointment of the year (rider): Nikias Arndt
Disappointment of the year (race): Course de la Paix
03/10Johan Lammerts goes ahead with Development team
1984 Ronde Van Vlaanderen winner will continue his partnership with the Belgian team despite he is unsure about the sponsor which supported the youth team in the 2020 season.
The promotion at WT level by the main team brought a necessary increase of investments and responsabilities, and while former rider is ready for the new challenge, seems that local news emitter "Omroep Zeeland" will take a step back. We are still waiting for confirmations.
Early this morning Johan Lammerts reassured fans about the future on his Social channels: "Ready for another season! I wouldn't have agreed to continue if I wasn't sure to have the necessary guarantees. First season has been very successful, not just for the results on the road, but we grew up guys who next year will debut at WT level! I'm very proud of the work.
It would have been a pity to quit the project, paradoxically thanks to the achievements of the main team, that's the reason why I'm in talks with some new possible partners from late August, when we understood that we were in a confortable promotion spot.
Announcements won't come sooner than the end of the scouting stuff."
Tierra del Fuego 
Juan Chamorro, who was listed as 2nd strongest climber - and Top 3 in the team standings.
Germán Ollero's 5th place in the KoM standings - our greatest talent showed a lot of engagement, getting into the breakaway on most mountain stages, showing great fighting spirit. That's the way to go, boys!!!
Int. Österreich-Rundfahrt
Kigali GP
Volta a Portugal  
Tour of Vancouver
Circulo de Juarez
