Shonak wrote:
So finished 2014 Lampre Season much faster than expected. Sim'd through of lots of races though (as usual), especially nearly the entire Vuelta (except for 3 MT-stages, had to play Angliru stage of course <3 ) because the competition was so extremely dull and boring... I normaly play either Tirreno-Adr. or Paris-Nice (depending on Sponsor), MSR, Vlaanderen Classics, Ardenees Classics, Grand Tours, WC, Lombardia... so I'm a pretty straight-forward guy I suppose. I can't get bothered to play Crit-Dauph or Tour de Suisse for example when I'm already anxious for Tour.
In my current Astana season, playing these races paid off big time with a 1-2 Down Under and Bozic winning Gent-Wevelgem and Vattenfall, which would be extremely hard to pull off in simulation. Vattenfall was awesome by the way: Flecha thought he'd finish a late attack and was already celebrating his victory, but Bozic came on so strong in the sprint that he beat the Spaniard at the line. The bad news is that Bozic got injured after this win, so I need to rely on Ponzi (sprint) or Gasparotto (attack) for Plouay. We will see how it goes...
For now, however, I will put Astana on hold. After Nibali's TdF victory, I realised that I've won all the major races with the team and I know Astana so well that it's getting a bit dull. Even the future development of the team will be predictable with Aru, Nazarbayev and Lutsenko heading to the world top and Nibali still being awesome for about 5 more years, so I've decided to give myself a new challenge.
The new challenge is called Katusha. With the key riders being rather old, I will be forced to overcome some tough challenges and build a new team over the years. It will also be interesting to get Russian cycling back on its feet (currently, there are no Russians in the top-100 of CQ Ranking!) with Chernetskiy as my highest hope for now. To make things even more exciting, Rodriguez refuses to renew his contract and Menchov will be retiring. Fortunately, Moreno (2 years) and Kristoff (3 years) renewed, but I will need to do a good job on the transfer market to have a competitive team in 2014.
My setup for 2013 will have Paolini and Kristoff aiming for the cobbled classics and Hamburg/Plouay/Canada, while Rodriguez will target Tirreno, Suisse, TdF and Lombardia, leaving Moreno for Catalunya, Vasco, Ardennes classics, San Sebastian and the Vuelta. Menchov and Spilak will go for Paris-Nice before supporting Rodriguez's quest for the TdF podium and we will prepare Kolobnev perfectly for the World Championships. In the Giro, we'll be going for stage wins and possibly mountain jersey or top-10 with Caruso. This setup means that Katusha won't be the top favourite in any race (except for Lombardia maybe), so getting good results should be truly rewarding. But let's get started with the Tour Down Under, aiming for the GC podium with Kolobnev.
Good luck with Katusha. I thought about riding them too some day. The good thing about russia: You just need one legendary scout and he will do all the work since there's only Russia as a Region. Hopefully you can give Purito the Grand Tour win he has been longing for so long.
I myself actually put up the challenge that I won't hire riders who are better than my current ones in their average stats (right now this means: no riders over 77). They may develop to become better (hopefully) but this way I'll keep the level of my Lampre career whilst trying to improve my squad year over year. I also try to always have a positive balance of sponsor-engagement - Rider & staff-cost and not solely rely on prizey money (although I think most people keep it that).
Ulissi got 5th place at Amstel. I was riding like a dick and had quite a bit of luck by getting in the right breakaway but it worked. Fleche and Liege were decent too, Ulissi got a 9th rank and Poels 10th at Liege. Right now at the Giro things look good. I won the team time trial and Scarponi snatched a victory in the 2nd week (still good for a stage win at Age 36, I believe ). Caruso is my team leader, Cungeo & my future GT-contender Caroli are more or less in a free-role. On a hilly stage we put into Purito around 7 minutes thus (probably) eliminating one of your biggest opponents for podium (he was very bad positinoned when we turned up the heat, so fyi he didn't crash). Uran and Mollema probably are too good for my squad but I'll see what I can do. Caroli lost already 5 minutes though so it will be hard to achieve "his" goal (Top 10) at the end (he is developing great, MT 76). If he manages to get Top 10, I'll just try the World Championship with him too (Nibali and Aru don't want to attend, although it's the Mountain WC-race) instead of riding Vuelta with him for U25 rider jersey, maybe I can pull off a miracle at making him the youngest WC ever (Age 22-23). He should have 78 or 79 at MT by the end of the year, so it's actually possible depending on the favourites race year schedule and their fitness. Either way, very pleased with Carolis development - I use cyclist_progession by Kentaurus and a 0.3 development. Other young riders are developing much slower, I suppose Caroli is just one of a kind. ^^
Pozzatto wasn`t too good at cobblestone classics. Somewhere around 15 at P-R, 5th place at RvV and 5th at Gent. Since his Age of Decline will kick in next season I really need to find a new cobblestone expert - Daniel Oss or Puccio being my favourite choices obviously.
Edited by Shonak on 30-09-2013 17:37
"It’s a little bit scary when Contador attacks." - Tommy V
Having a decent start with Katusha so far. Failed to win Tour Down Under, because Lars Bak was lucky with a breakaway, but Kolobnev won a stage and ended second. Paolini came in second behind Boonen in Omloop & Kuurne, but took his revenge by winning Strade Bianche. Currently riding Paris-Nice, where Menchov is third behind Casar and Horner. Will be tough to win this one, as well as Tirreno-Adriatico, where Katusha lost 46 seconds to Sky in the team time trial.
I restarted the race two times (something I never or at least very rarely do), so I wouldn't call it easy. As seen by my results for Fleche and Liege, my riders are still not good enough to get top results at the ardennees classics on a regular basis. I was lucky enough that Ulissi got +4 fitness, caught the right break and Poels (who was in the breakaway too) worked his ass off so that the other groups didn't catch up to the breakaway. I remember wrong though, Ulissi didn't get 5th rank, he got 3rd and completed an all italian podium (Nibali, Moser, Ulissi).
Caruso took Mountain time trial & a mountain stage at the Giro (the first time my actual leader takes stage wins at the Giro, yeah!). It seems that the 3rd place is rather save. Caroli with some top results resides at Rank 11, one behind Cunego. Maybe I let Cunego play a domestique role now so that Caroli gets his Top-10 result. Unfortunately there is no way he will get the best young rider jersey this year since 4 out of 10 riders are below 25 (Pinot, Kelderman, Bardet, Aru). Team classifications is save, around 30 minutes before Radioshack. So, 4 stage wins, podium rank 3, presumably 4 riders in the top 25 - good Giro I'd say for Lampre. Uran is incredible strong riding for Movistar, Mollema with some nice victories on a comfortable 2nd place. Overall, it's a good, nice Giro although I find the stage-pattern a bit dull: Mostly it's just a finish at the mountain-top or two mountains at the end. Hopefully there will be a bit more variance in the coming seasons (especially looking forward to emeeas Giro).
Edited by Shonak on 30-09-2013 23:32
"It’s a little bit scary when Contador attacks." - Tommy V
What the... I just had the strangest AI ever. It must be a bug but I'd get to that in a second.
So finished the Giro on Rank 3, Caroli got 10th. He even managed to hold up on the last 3 mountain stages with the best riders and now has 77 Mountain (boy, that guy is developing fast). Pretty darn sweet Giro result-wise.
Caruso then profited from his Giro-form and got 4th at Tour de Suisse. At the 2nd last MT stage I attacked with Caruso but got zabeld on the line by Valverde. Caruso already had his hands in the air and Valverde just came too fast.
On the transfermarket are Oss, Aru and Marcato. Marcato already signed, hopefully Oss and Aru will do too. Also some good other riders on the market such as Majka, Roche, Purito, Cavendish, Boonen, Froome... should be a intense transfer season and I'll keep continuing on presenting these transfers, primarly to give myself an overview.
Sooo, the Tour started. It's the one where the Mont Ventoux stage is on the third day. Kittel (SKY) took the first stage win and Lampre came in only 3 seconds behinds Froome's Omega Pharma. My squad for the Tour is: Pozzovivo, Anacona, Ulissi, Niemiec (Age of Decline), Mori, Verona, Pietropolli, Palini. I imagine with Malori we would have won but he got injured and focuses on the WC TT. All in all a promising start.
Well then the Mont Ventoux were things started to get strange... I first noticed it when Nibali protected Brajkovic instead of the other way around. Astana also have Wiggins and Tangert. 4 top riders. Before the Mont Ventoux, there are two smaller climbs. On the second one, the peloton got heavily split and many small groups. Peloton had around 40 riders left. I think Froome was all alone, Cavendish in yellow by the way. I had one rider in the top group (Verona) and he was fantastic, holding up the longest before getting caught. I missed to put Anacona and Niemiec to be put in the peloton and I imagine with their help Pozzo would have been even better. Well anyway, I get sidetracked easily: When Saxo, Movistar and Sky made the pace, Froome and Nibali just left behind. Wiggins and Brajkovic were following closely, though both primary Tour Contenders just did... nothing. I thought they were just bad positioned but when Contador and Quintana attacked and much of the favourites left the group, hell -both of them just rode fairly slow up the Mont Ventoux. They did not make any reaction whatsoever. Ulissi even was in their group and could easily go with their pace. They got around 14 minutes that day and it's just weird by the AI: I imagine Nibali "not being the leader", although it makes no sense whatsoever to me, since Astana is pretty strong. Maybe the AI set Wiggins or Brajkovic as respective team captain. Froome, it just doesn't make sense since there's not a single decent Mountain rider at all in the squad. Maybe this has something to do with Cavendish being in yellow. It certainly shouldn't be a matter of form since they both finished Crit-Daup on the Podium behind TVG. Maybe there was a masssprint in the quick sim of the first stage and Froome and Nibali got injured there. It's really the only explanation I can come up with. But hey, whatever! This is obviously fantastic for me.... Pozzovivo came in 5th at the Mont Ventoux and has good chances for the podium. There won't be a way past Contador and Quintana but I imagine Valverde could be doable (MT 81 though, 35 - I edited his Age of Decline a bit). Gotta ride smart. He is currently 4th in GC and a Top 10 result shouldn't be a problem for him while the other 3 riders will try to take stage wins in breakaways.
Edited by Shonak on 01-10-2013 11:40
"It’s a little bit scary when Contador attacks." - Tommy V
Interesting developments on Ventoux. Could be a crash or illness indeed, hard to tell.
In the meanwhile, Katusha is on fire! Trofimov won 2 stages in Paris-Nice through breakaways, while Menchov managed to lose contact with his main rivals on a crucial descent and lost his podium place. The race was obviously won by Horner, before a surprisingly strong Casar. Nibali, Contador and Menchov completed the top-5. Top-3 was a sponsor goal though.
In the Tirreno, Katusha washed away a weak time trial with a superb Chieti stage. Dani Moreno did a fantastic job launching Rodriguez, who took the stage and the leader's jersey. If he can take some more time on Prati di Tivo, he can survive the short time trial and take the GC.
Checked out possible replacements for Rodriguez too. I'll do everything to get Nibali if he doesn't renew at Astana... just can't help it Edited by Blueprint on 02-10-2013 14:26
So yet another season is nearly over. Very pleased with the team`s development.
Contador won fairly easy the Tour although Quintana seemed to be overall stronger. Nibali must have been surely handicapped somehow, Froome came in later in the game and won two time trials (8th overall). Pozzovivo was great in the mountains and kept up with the best. Unfortunately he lost time in many of the hilly stages (6th overall). Ulissi won in a breakaway on a hilly stage, whilst Anacona did a triumphal solo-breakaway over several mountains and took a much desevered stage win. Nobody wanted to work in his breakaway so I just decided that he goes in for himself. He prevailed superbly. Great Tour from him. The Anacona stage in particular was a joy to play as they peloton completely stretched out and was very thin early on. Many favourites had to do their own work. Some other great stages too. Say what you will about the Tour, but in PCM, it definitely has the best mountain stages. Also, there were lots of breakaway wins in general. Especially when Contador caught up to riders from breakaways he didn't even sprint. Now, this is probably just something with stats, but I like to think that this actually fits Contador's persona quite good. Not such a cannibal like Froome or even Nibali (who took waaay too many stages at the Giro 2013).
I went into the Vuelta with Poels as my captain and Verona in sorta a free role. Verona showed his talent by winning a mountain stage (in a breakaway as usual). Poels did awesome in the mountains. He was up against Pinot, Contador, Daniel Martin and he did a great job. It's a real shame that he leaves Lampre next season though. Basically all the time he lost was in the (simulated) time trial, unfortunately. In the end, he was 4 seconds behind Contador on the 4th rank in Madrid. Pinot won before Daniel Martin. Again, some very nice stages with unexpected events.
As mentioned before, prepared especially for the World Championship this year. It's Massa-Massa route, so it favors climbers. Especially Nibali obviously. Malori won the WC ITT by 9 seconds so quite a good start, which is pretty awesome. That rainbow jersey surely will look good on him.
For the road race, Nibali only had like 70-75 fitness, whilst my riders had around 80-90. Caroli was in great shape. I set good pace at the 3rd last mountain and thinned out the peloton. Nibali however had +5 day fitness and it did pretty good, so I used Caroli as an answer to several attacks in hope that he might get away. It never worked and Pozzo, Rosa and Caruso took over the pace again. Contador was strong, but Poels was really god damn strong. Yes, my Poels. Actually I thought about letting him ride away since then I'd have the rainbow jersey for a couple of weeks. But since he transfers next season to a continental team (and I wanna see that damn jersey) I had to go with Nibali, who attacked at the top and just went crazy on the downhill and came in first (for Italy and Astana). Maybe the rainbow jersey helps a bit for next year's Tour, the Nibali in my career surely had some enough bad moments by now. Caroli came in fifth, in a group with Quintana and Rui Costa, pretty great performance by him. Poels at 2nd place is great too.
So with my guys being in top-shape I had a good shot at Lombardia. Caroli and Cunego both went at the last hill and Cunego managed to break away over the hill, when Nibali and Gilbert just looked at each other. Cunego took the chance and went downhill and they would have nearly caught him in the sprint but he won Lombardia. One last victory for Cunego probably, since his Age of Decline will kick in soon. Pretty darn sweet. 3 important victories (plus, Caruso took Mondevisa - or whatever it's name is) at the end of the season rounds up a successfull season. Pozzatto also won a few week races like 5 days of Dunkerque (or wahtever it's name is excatly in english ) Hopefully next seasons starts equally good.
2015 Overview
UCI Ranking 2015
Spoiler
1. Sagan (SKY)
2. Valverde (SKY)
3. Betancur (AG2R)
4. Daniel Martin (MOV)
5. L.L. Sanches (BEL)
Paris-Nice: Valverde (SKY)
Tirreno-Adriatico: Daniel Martin (MOV)
Tour de Romandie: Betancur (AG2R)
Crit-Dauph: TVG (BEL)
Tour de Suisse: Valverde (SKY)
Tour de Pologne: Stannard (SKY
Eneco Tour: Phinney (BMC)
Lampre:
IN
Fabio Aru - Astana
Daniel Oss - BMC
Nizzolo - Radioshack
Velits - Omega Pharma
Marcato - Vacansoleil
/No new decent talents found this season.
OUT
Pozzovivo -> Accent Jobs (refused new contract)
Poels -> BANK BGZ (refused new contract)
Ferrari -> BMC (no new contract offered)
Wackerman -> BMC (refused new contract)
Niemiec - Vacansoleil (no new contract offered)
Pietropolli -> Cannondale (no new contract offered)
Trentin -> Ridley (refused new contract)
Mori -> Tirol (no new contract offered)
As you can see, I did some nice tranfers I think. I especially look forward to Aru and Nizzolo. Not sure about where my focus will lie on next season as it will depend on sponsor goals but I'd like to take on the Giro with Caruso/Caroli as a double phalanx, and Aru maybe Tour. With Oss I have a great new captain for the cobblestone classics and I'm sure Pozzato can help him. My cobblestone talent has still a long way to go to be competitive.
Competition-wise SKY look to be the team for Nizzolo, there actual sprint train (Sagan, Greipel, Degenkolb, Goss, Demare) is just insane. For this they seem to have given up on GC with Wiggins far beyond his peak as leader. Astana (Nibali, Valverde, Brajkovic - 4th overall last Tour), Movistar (Porte, Martin, Rodriguez - though Age of Decline kicked in already) and AG2R (Froome, Betancur) will definitely make for a good Tour next year and at least Astana will be my toughest opponents, next to Sagan, at the Ardennes classics. Katusha (Contador) and Radioshack (Uran) may have great riders but I'm not so sure that they have a good enough squad to support their leaders enough but we'll see. Henao and L.L. Sanches at Europcar could be a tough combo at Ardennes classics too, while Omega Pharma regain their cobblestone advantage with Boonen's return and Vanmarcke in the squad too. Terpstra left though to Orica (I think).
To Caroli: Great season for him, definitely. 5th at WC, 10th at Giro, 11th at Il Lombardia. He is improving a lot. Hopefully he will continue and I might even consider him for the Vuelta (if the WC stage is rather flat, I think Doha should be next). His hill stats like Hill or Acc. are not so high though so I don't consider him yet as an option for Ardennes and rather focus him now on good Grand Tour classifications, always keeping an eye out for a big surprise.
EDIT: Caroli got 2th place at Tour de Beijing. His first podium (not counting Giro Team Time Trial).
Sad day though, Cancellara retires in my career. I'd probably bring him back if I wasn't afraid that my save game would get fucked up again (like constant crashes return or smthg like that). Besides that, his Age of Decline already kicked in, so he wouldn't on top anymore anyway. Not excatly happy about it though (I remember at my Volkswagen career he raced until his 38 xD)
Edited by Shonak on 03-10-2013 21:48
"It’s a little bit scary when Contador attacks." - Tommy V
Just finished 1 season with Lampre won gent and e3 with pozzato, amstel with cunego then at giro i was 2nd in gc with scarponi i got 2 stage wins (1 stage win scarponi and jose serpa 1) then at tdf niemec and ullisi were the leaders niemec finished at 12th and ullisi at 15th with Two stage wins! Then at the vuelta cunego was the leader (preparing for wc) he finished 4th in gc and took 1 stage. At the wc i was Italy working for Cunego(nibali and others out of form) and i won ahead of albasini. The giro winner was Nibali. Tour was won by Contador and a surprise in the vuelta as Henao won it ahead of Schleck. Wc Itt was won by spartacus. I also won tour down under with ullisi, tour of beijing with cunego and i finished 2nd in the Uci team standing!
I'm trying to decide what to play when the PCM DB comes out. I've not played past one season yet due to lack of routes (as i'm too lazy to individually add the races one by one XD).
I'm thinking I might make a Colombian WT team, probably with some other South American and US riders (since that would make logical sense sponsor wise I think). Picking the top end is hard though. Bentencur, Quintana, Uran and Henao is probably overkill XD. Especially as the first two will probably get stat boosts compared to where they are now (well, on the original DBs, might have got modded in the new official DB but i'm still running on old saves atm.)
So, i've got a Little Problem with my Node 4 - Giordana Career: I'm currently on the day before the penuniltimate stage of the Giro friuli. I'm signed in for an extra two one day races on the day of the last stage. We've only got 11 riders though, 6 of them ridig friuli. Now my question is: what to do? pull out of friuli completely (best GC positions are 13, 14 and 15) or try to enter the other races with one or two riders or something completly different?
Dippofix wrote:
So, i've got a Little Problem with my Node 4 - Giordana Career: I'm currently on the day before the penuniltimate stage of the Giro friuli. I'm signed in for an extra two one day races on the day of the last stage. We've only got 11 riders though, 6 of them ridig friuli. Now my question is: what to do? pull out of friuli completely (best GC positions are 13, 14 and 15) or try to enter the other races with one or two riders or something completly different?
If you don't have at least one cyclist to bring at a race your iscription will be cancelled so... no problem!
@Shonak: very nice transfers and good to see Nibali win the Worlds! But what do you mean with him being a cannibal, is that what happened in your 2013 season? In the real world, he only won two stages, one of them being a time trial.
I hope to finish Tirreno-Adriatico and ride some classics this weekend. Really wish I had some more time for this...
Hey
I'am starting a new career with a custom-made team around Sagan. Its slovenian/slovakian oritaded + some cheap strong riders. How do you think about this team? To strong or not for a PCT
Blueprint wrote:
Wow, Lampre seems popular these days
@Shonak: very nice transfers and good to see Nibali win the Worlds! But what do you mean with him being a cannibal, is that what happened in your 2013 season? In the real world, he only won two stages, one of them being a time trial.
I mean the PCM Giro 2013 of course. He won like 5-6 stages and Scarponi back then was like two-three time 2nd, which was kinda... well, frustrating when Nibali simply outsprints you after you try so hard to drop him. I think Nibali also won Tirreno, Tour de Suisse and so forth... he was really without remorse in the first season, much more content now.
Sponsor goals are in:
Stage win at Tirreno, Top 5 at MSR, Gent and E3, Top 10 at RvV and Roubaix should be more than possible. Unfortunately with Nizzolo's signing Lampre wants me to win the points jersey at the Giro, so that will be... difficult (especially considering the Sky Sprinttrain - hope not too many high calibers will ride the Giro). Stage wins at Tour de France and Top 5 at Vuelta are definitely within reach, with the latter being the big season goal by Caroli.
@nielsboy: Yes, very strong. Just by having Sagan in the squad its already good enough for WT.
Edited by Shonak on 04-10-2013 17:53
"It’s a little bit scary when Contador attacks." - Tommy V
). Caruso is my team leader, Cungeo & my future GT-contender Caroli are more or less in a free-role. On a hilly stage we put into Purito around 7 minutes thus (probably) eliminating one of your biggest opponents for podium (he was very bad positinoned when we turned up the heat, so fyi he didn't crash). Uran and Mollema probably are too good for my squad but I'll see what I can do. Caroli lost already 5 minutes though so it will be hard to achieve "his" goal (Top 10) at the end (he is developing great, MT 76). If he manages to get Top 10, I'll just try the World Championship with him too (Nibali and Aru don't want to attend, although it's the Mountain WC-race) instead of riding Vuelta with him for U25 rider jersey, maybe I can pull off a miracle at making him the youngest WC ever (Age 22-23). 
He should have 78 or 79 at MT by the end of the year, so it's actually possible depending on the favourites race year schedule and their fitness. Either way, very pleased with Carolis development - I use cyclist_progession by Kentaurus and a 0.3 development. Other young riders are developing much slower, I suppose Caroli is just one of a kind. ^^
Caruso already had his hands in the air and Valverde just came too fast.
