Hi all, first message from a bit of a newbie so forgive me if anything I ask seems obvious. Just got a few questions about starting a career:
1. What do you do first when planning a season? I am using the Season Planner downloaded from this site to sort out training and who rides what races (I have it working properly - so no problems there!). Is it best to set the riders fitness peaks first, or what races they ride? Obviously some riders have two obvious key races, so aim them for those, but how do I decide what to do with the other riders?
2. Apart from the key goals for the season (for example, it's obvious Cancellara should peak for Paris-Roubaix, and Contador for TdF), how do you decide which racers to ride which races? How many days racing should the big stars be riding before their main goals, and also what should the 'lesser' riders be peaking for? The same races as the leader they're 'helping', or the smaller races that they could do well in?
3. (Last one!) I find the finances screen in game pretty confusing. Is there any screen that shows you how much money you have spare for signing new riders? I can see a 'balance' type amount that goes down when you pay a signing on fee, for example. I remember playing PCM 07 or something, and signed too many good riders, but because there was no wage budget in the game to tell me I was spending too much, I bankrupted the team the next season. I guess what I'm asking is is there anything like in Football Manager where you have a weekly wage budget you can see, so you know for sure if you are spending too much or too little?
1. I define the race participation first, then set the fitness schedule.
2. 60 race days is the max. after that your riders lose race fitness. But it decreases slowly, so they can make 70 or 80 days without problems, but it might get harder to win. A rider needs some time to gain its max race fitness of 20 if he has not reached it yet.
3. The game starts with +/- even budget so you don't have much money to spend on new riders. There is a finance page which shows a prediction of your finances (below the bars, predictions are for middle of year and end of year).
Edited by Lachi on 21-09-2010 15:15
1. Using the Lachi's Season Planner, first assign your leaders with the races you want them to take part in, and then set their training accordingly. Take into account the fact that no rider can peak indefinitely, but be generous when it's important.
2. Secondly, after assigning the leaders with their share of the races (don't forget that riders lose their max. race form when they ride more than 60 days), assign their lieutenants (1 or 2) for each important race, and of course, helpers and teammates according to their preferences, and of course, abilities. You don't need all the helpers in their peak form all the time, so it is not a problem if they ride for more than 60 days.
Apart from the basic fitness training, your leaders should always have at least 10/20 racing fitness before their main season goals (if it's a stage race), and at least 15/20 race fitness if it's a one day race.
For example if you want to peak for the Flanders classics, you should most definitely start with the Paris-Nice or Tirreno-Adriatico, that would increase your race fitness while you wait for the training fitness to rise. Romandie before the Giro, Dauphine or Switzerland before the Tour, etc.
IMO, lesser riders as you've called them, should never really peak, because then they can be more useful for a longer period of time, their fatigue bar will fill more slowly, but you should definitely peak your lieutenants for the races their leaders are taking part in, or for the races you are certain they will have a shot at winning a stage or GC or whatever.
3. In the finances page you have the New Salaries Fund item, which shows you how much money you are earning, or losing each month, and below that is a prediction of how much money you will have in the bank in October. And of course, don't be afraid of going into minus if you plan to win many races.
If offense is the best defence, does it mean that defence is the worst defence?
If I should die before I wake, I pray the Lord will delete my browser history.
2. For clarification, a rider needs 15 days of racing before he can get to the maximum of 20 points of race fitness, although he can get to about 16 points from 10 days of racing.
When I look at what races to ride, it depends on whether I am Continental or Pro Tour. PT is easier, because there is a well defined set of PT races which covers most of the season, and which often lead into each other nicely e.g. my leader for the ENECO tour will always ride the Tour of Poland to get his race fitness high etc. With a Continental team, its a bit more random, and I will pick races which fit my leaders capabilities e.g. if I have a really good sprinter I will try to get into the Tour of Oman and Tour of Qatar, as they are totally flat etc.
In terms of deciding who rides what, I tend to split my riders into groups e.g. good climbers who can help in GT races, TTers, sprinters etc, and then work on the basis of for an average stage race I probably need something like the following personnel:
e.g. Grand Tour (9 riders)
1 x Leader
1 x mountain helper for leader
1 x Main sprinter
2 x leadout men (1 with high Fl, 1 with decent sprint)
1 x mountain breakaway rider (for the KOM classification)
1 x hilly classics rider for breakaway victories
1 x general domestique
Obviously I will modify this as necessary, so in the Giro I would favour riders with high TT stats as there is a Team Time Trial, or if I was looking at the Vuelta al Pais Vasco there are no sprint stages in that so I can leave out the whole sprint train......
But as a basis for selecting riders, splitting them into groups allows me to see where my team is strong or weak, and make sure I have a rounded team for most, if not all, races. Obviously it doesn't always work out, and for some races you will have no choice but to send out a weak team, but on the whole you can get it right with some trial and error.
I've attached a planning document which has the 1st season race programme for my current career as an example.
btw Lachi's season planner is excellent for grouping the riders....
hope this helps good luck
EDIT - looks like Deda got there before me with his post and covered some of the stuff I've written - took too long typing!
Cheers guys, will have another look at this later given what you've said. Will take a closer look at which races lead into which others. I decided to have a go with Saxo Bank just to break myself in gently, so I'll start by organising the cobbled classics team and Schleck's plan for the Tour. Do you guys treat the warm-up races (e.g. the Tour de Suisse for Tour de France) as just that, warm-ups, or do you have someone peaking there to try to win stages/GC? Also is it worth riding races where my third or fourth best sprinter (the luxury team mate type riders) can actually win and sending them as leaders there (like the 2.1/2.2 class races). Or would you just keep them to lead out the main sprinter in the primary goal races?
good luck
