The season soon comes to an end and with just 3 remaining PT races, it`s not much time to change the ranking.
The TTT event from Copenhagen to Malmo is coming next and looking on last years result it was a domination by Jack Wolfskin, who won with 48s ahead of Milka and Festina.
Surely also teams, we have to look at this season:
Project 1t4i is usually doing well in TTT and even though their name is different, they are still the defending champion with several riders, who were part of the 2012 success. Gesink, Posthuma, Vaugrenard, Sanchez Gil...Being not far above the relegation zone, this could be a very important race for them. Milka might not be as strong as last year even though their core kept the same with Coppel, Kreuziger, Bouet, Nepomnyachsniy. Another podium is possible as Coppel belongs to the very best and can carry a team. Festina with Fothen, Bernaudeu, Donald, Navardauskas, Rolland...so a team filled with excellent time trialists. Surely they want to improve here as they need points to climb a bit more in the rankings.
Ranking wise it might be a great fight between Koenigsegg and Wikipedia for the PT crown. And it`s tough to say, what team is stronger here. Wikipedia with the new ITT World Champion Taylor Phinney as standout rider. Bookwalter and Janse van Rensburg will surely help him while the rest mainly needs to hang on there. Koenigsegg`s standout rider is Fiedler. But as their 2nd best time trialist in Trofimov isn`t starting, their advantage over Wikipedia is more or less gone as the next time trialists Johansson, Danacik, Renäng or Wetterhall are surely good but not much better than Phinney`s support.
There probably is no huge favourite between those two.
And it`s also close in the lower part of the rankings. While Venchi is pretty much relegated already other teams are still hoping. Bacardi really struggled this year as their leaders couldn`t deliver as much as expected. And also this TTT isn`t their best strength, so scoring big times here isn`t very probable and relegation might be hard to avoid. Heineken though belongs to the better teams here eventhough Braijkovic is not at the start. Koren, Bauer, Van Zandbeek and Ligthart though do make a nice core here. Lotto also with a decent team here around Bonnet, Lloret, Aramendia and Mazur. A top10 is possible and would be very important. B&O often was carried by Pluchkin. But the Moldovan won`t be able to help the team here. Neither is young stage racer Keinath. So it`s up to their pure time trialists Steensen, Christensen, Vandborg, Stenersen. Still not a bad team to be honest, but without their two leaders they might not score enough here to create a gap to the relegation zone. Puma and Pendleton are still in the relegation battle but while Puma is here with a weak team, they can`t really hope for a lot of points while Pendleton`s around Wiggins, Faiers, Gusev, Casas has a decent team here and can hope to get a fair result and some more points to extend the gap to the relegating teams. Wiggle and Pokerstars might be safe eventually but the gap isn`t big neither. So a decent result here might help. At least Wiggle should do well here seeing their lineup: Ignatiev, Ghyselinck, Schär, Malori...Top10, top5 or even a podium? Everything is possible here. But at least they should score a bit more than other teams in bigger danger. Santander`s full focus on the GT`s might save them even though they are only a mid table team in 2013. Their team here is just riding for the last spots most likely. Simply Red Bull or shall I say Cancellara? He still belongs to the best as shown in the Worlds and also Bobridge and Durbridge are nice additions. But except of that not much more here, so it would be surprise to see them going for a very high result. But you`ll never know when Cancellara is involved as he can pull a full team.
Not much to say about Aker, UBS, Pearl Adidas or Vesuvio here as they also shouldn`t do too much here.
Of course the race I hated the most to choose a lineup for in preseason as I know it would be really hard to just give points away to whoever we would battle in the closing races of the season.
Therefore obviously there is nothing I can do here but hoping we will still be above the cut after the race. Then it's all about Bennati making sure it won't be a do-or-die fight of VDB vs. Keinath in Tasmania and Lombardia. Edited by cio93 on 27-01-2014 16:18
Looking forward to these last few races, I should do alright in most of them, though I admit I am looking for a bit of good daily form for this TTT. I'll be stronger come next season though with Burke and Malori improving.
Our team is well suited for these sort of races, but I doubt we can win, nor get a top 3 (despite us doing 3rd two consecutive years). We really need to do well here though as we are not going to get any more points - Or very little atleast.
Here the missing team of Metinvest. As you can see a pretty strong squad with 8 good time trialists. No outstanding rider but definitely one of the better half teams being led by some veterans as Popovych or former German ITT Champion Lang.
