This ranking update covers all races that have taken place since the end of February so starting from Barbados Cycling Festival all the way to Roma Maxima. This was a busy period with lots of short stage races and classics so we split things up in two parts based on the race categories:
PTHC & HC
Two PTHC races took place since the last ranking update:
Sauber was the top scoring PCT team in the Vuelta a Colombia on the back of strong stage results by Slagter and Pomoshnikov. Minions with double stage winner Alvaro Hodeg were the next best team.
Carlsberg, Philips and Bralirwa were the best scoring teams in the only PTHC classic of the month, Macskako Kerekparverseny.
Barbados saw a very balanced scoring with Lierse, Podium Ambition, Bralirwa, Red Bull, Indosat, Voyagin and Popo4Ever all scoring above 100 points. Pais Vasco was dominated by Lierse finishing first and second with Oomen and Novak which was the highest race scoring of a PCT team in this season so far.
cycleYorkshire and Aker were the top teams in Strade Bianche while Carlsberg, Carrefour and once again Aker did best in E3.
The Tour de Pologne was the anticipated battleground for the dual threat climbers Kwiatkowski and Beltran so Cedevita and Aker were the top scoring teams.
Team
Barb
VPaV
Col
StBi
E3 P
Kere
TdPo
Total
Aker - MOT
70
77
78
103
94
21
282
725
Lierse SK - Pizza Ullo PCTeam
155
376
124
14
14
0
0
683
Red Bull Zalgiris
114
213
35
16
43
0
119
540
cycleYorkshire
55
75
0
140
0
0
197
467
Cedevita
45
52
0
66
0
0
299
462
Assa Abloy
33
119
0
0
45
36
210
443
Carlsberg - Danske Bank
85
58
0
0
155
89
48
435
Binance Cycling
0
196
90
43
75
0
13
417
Minions
36
85
161
31
26
0
51
390
Sauber Petronas Racing
38
55
192
87
0
0
0
372
Team UBS
0
113
0
70
17
20
145
365
Bralirwa - Stevens
123
46
0
0
90
70
35
364
Tryg - Ritter Sport
0
137
115
12
5
0
81
350
Kraftwerk Man Machine
91
0
134
64
12
2
35
338
Voyagin - Bird
110
84
102
0
0
0
29
325
Team Popo4Ever p/b Nemiroff
103
29
66
52
26
0
41
317
Philips - Force India
13
52
0
10
84
84
39
282
Carrefour - ESPN
19
27
11
23
103
34
58
275
Project: Africa
42
41
88
0
0
0
99
270
Polar
54
74
0
0
23
0
95
246
Duolingo
0
104
0
30
0
0
111
245
Jura - Fiat
0
17
80
0
0
0
133
230
Podium Ambition
144
0
0
0
0
0
45
189
Indosat Ooredoo
114
34
0
15
0
0
0
163
Eurosport x GCN
15
61
0
31
0
0
20
127
Los Pollos Hermanos
12
0
98
5
0
0
10
125
C1 & C2
The Minions scored best in Jelajah by finishing with the 4th & 5th GC places ahead of Polar and Binance who finished top 2 in GC.
Bralirwa was the top scoring team in Circulo de Juarez, Kuurne and Roma - Maxima.
Cedevita was the top scoring team in the Baltic Chains Tour while Kraftwerk dominated the scoring in Eritrea thanks to Nikias Arndt.
The only C2 race with significant scoring for PCT teams was the Tour of California where Kraftwerk scored best ahead of Minions.
Team
Jela
Bada
Juar
CPla
Erit
KBK
Cali
Balt
RoMa
Bralirwa - Stevens
79
15
165
0
60
80
0
84
83
566
Binance Cycling
135
0
89
0
22
0
0
74
30
350
Kraftwerk Man Machine
0
0
40
0
194
0
78
0
0
312
Minions
157
0
28
0
0
39
47
16
24
311
Cedevita
0
0
48
0
90
0
0
158
0
296
Indosat Ooredoo
43
0
114
0
0
0
0
101
0
258
Los Pollos Hermanos
0
0
61
0
106
0
0
63
0
230
Lierse SK - Pizza Ullo PCTeam
0
0
84
0
71
28
0
0
37
220
Team Popo4Ever p/b Nemiroff
69
8
33
0
94
0
0
0
0
204
Carlsberg - Danske Bank
0
0
0
0
107
9
0
0
54
170
Philips - Force India
40
8
0
0
31
31
0
46
12
168
Assa Abloy
0
0
18
0
64
0
0
85
0
167
Polar
151
0
0
1
0
0
0
0
0
152
Red Bull Zalgiris
61
0
1
0
0
0
0
88
0
150
Jura - Fiat
11
18
50
1
65
0
0
0
0
145
Carrefour - ESPN
0
0
0
0
39
59
0
0
44
142
Podium Ambition
0
0
49
0
0
0
8
54
27
138
Eurosport x GCN
0
0
0
0
0
56
0
0
56
112
Sauber Petronas Racing
36
0
0
0
73
0
0
0
0
109
cycleYorkshire
0
0
0
0
56
0
0
28
0
84
Project: Africa
0
0
0
0
83
0
0
0
0
83
Team UBS
9
0
0
4
0
30
0
0
32
75
Aker - MOT
0
0
0
0
0
29
0
0
28
57
Voyagin - Bird
0
1
8
0
0
0
13
0
0
22
Duolingo
0
8
0
11
0
0
0
0
0
19
Tryg - Ritter Sport
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
Full Ranking
Bralirwa takes over the lead in the division thanks to an outstanding month of leader duo Stallaert and Silvestre. Popo4ever remain in the promotion spots while Binance and Aker climb into the promotion spots.
Lierse, Cedevita and Kraftwerk are the teams most improved as the three teams move away from the relegation spots while Carrefour, Duolingo, Project Africa and Podium Ambition have bigger drops into the middle of the ranking.
Tryg and Eurosport drop down into the relegation places where Indosat, Jura and Voyagin remain.
Keep sliding down the rankings. 12 pts in Barbados is really painful. Feel like we haven´t been on the lucky side of the results so far. With only 3 teams having worse pprd this needs to change quickly. Stallaert and Silvestre both doing exactly what cunego signed them for is great to see for an other 2020 CT team
There's the big rankings drop that moves us from title contenders, to 7th from bottom (projected).
I'm shocked Ewan is the 5th best sprinter really. But the killer sign is that our 2nd best scorer is still Alex Mayer riding high of the TDU result. Altur has struggled and AC is nowhere close to last years scoring.
We're well and truly deep into our relegation spiral, but at least our young Mauritian and Carribean lads have been showing good signs, even if they are not scoring many points.
First off, Bralirwa. Stallaert and Silvestre are killing it. Really nice job Cunego!
Looking at ourselves, just outside the top 5, but those PPRD look so juicy! Oomen still has a lot of race days left as well. Not sure how Tour of America will work pointwise, it seems hard to score there. And of course still quite a few races where we have to count on De Plus defending against the pucheur stars all over the division. Senni is also yet to score big. But in general, I don't think we will have to look down again this year, which is always nice.
Wild. We're now getting dangerously close to the point where I might have to take the possibility of promotion into serious consideration. I did not pick the PTHC band with Cheshire and Battenkill in it, which robs Stallaert of a few valuable scoring opportunities and makes it feel unlikely that we'll keep up that PpRD, given that we won't get much of anything from non-sprint stage races or classics. Then again, Silvestre only has 16 of his 42 race days done so far, so who knows.
Either way, I shall not view this season as anything other than what it is: an unmitigated, joyious success. To even be able to have the thoughts above, when I went into the season optimistic, but far from certain that we would succeed in staying up. And all this after randomly promoting as the #9 CT team of last year, no less ...
I feel bad at times knowing that while the AI was very kind to us, other managers with supposedly similarly strong or even stronger rosters can't seem to catch a break. But I am happy that my team building and planning strategy pays off how I intended. Way, way more than expected, to be sure, but pretty much exactly in the way it was supposed to.
Edited by cunego59 on 22-01-2022 20:11
No surprise to be way down the rankings, given the results so far - at least here's another ranking update where we don't have the red lantern.
Moscon and Masnada are doing fine so far, scoring about the points I expected them to take. Moscon even slightly above expectations in Poland lately.
But having level 1 Mauro Schmid as our 3rd best scorer says it all. On one hand, he's been ridiculously successful with breakaways, KoMs and U25 standings so far. Definitely wouldn't expect him to do this.
On the other hand, having Quintana as our 4th best scorer and Reinhardt all the way down in 7th (having used up a significant amount of RDs already) is just bad. And in the both cases I don't really know why this is. For Reinhardt, I find it pretty ridiculous by now, given that he worked very well last year, got a major OVL upgrade accompanied by a x2 raise, and now he just doesn't do anything useful. Either I was just completely unlucky until now, or that OVL modification came without looking too much into the new sprint AI. Still really angry about that one. (btw, Lienhard's +1.XX OVL is just a very bad joke so far ^^)
Congrats to fellow promoters from Bralirwa, going (pretty) high on Stallaert really pays off so far. Which was expected on the cobbles, but even as a sprinter he does way better than many (on paper) stronger sprinters. And Silvestre's a beast as well; I guess that double threat will easily secure you promotion even once the major cobbled classics are over.
And commiserations to Voyagin, PCM20 has really not been kind to you so far. Hope Kinoshita will step up his game, and together with Shikai will somehow secure you stay up!
We're headed in the right direction. We're staying out of the relegation fight at least, which was always priority #1. A top 10 position is nothing to scoff at. Plus, we've had great wildcard results that mean something to me even if they don't show up in the points totals.
At the same time, we're not quite in the promotion fight that some people expected us to be in. There have been a few underperformances, but by and large we've had plenty of luck. I think the bigger issue is just our roster construction. I think some people underestimated just how much our lack of a true puncheur would keep us back. I took a risk foregoing that discipline, but you can really see just how many of those days are on the calendar, where we know we can't score. A lot of those races happen to be HC and PTHC too, which offer more points than Guldhammer's C1 days. I do somewhat wish I had gotten a 100-150k to mop up minor points though, but I would have sacrificed elsewhere I guess.
That being said, I'm still somewhat optimistic. Trentin has done most of his calendar, but still has a few big opportunities left that could be critical. More importantly, Guldhammer still has almost his entire calendar left, outside of Eritrea, so he could score a lot. We'll see how AKA can do going forward, but he's got a lot of race days left.
In the end, our season will be made or broken by the Tour of America, which is kind of what I expected when I took that risk. If Warbasse and his crew can get close to repeating what he did in 2019, we'll be in the promotion hunt. If he flops, it's mid table and another rebuild. That's still a long way off though.
Thanks for the update knockout!
RIP Exxon Duke, David Veilleux, Double Feature, and Monster Energy
Oh wow, I thought we'd be a lot further down. Other teams can do even worse?
Turns out it was Hodeg's and Kalaba's top performances which keep us well clear of relegation danger, with the actual leaders Hagen, Uran and especially Vesely underperforming quite a bit. If you'd said Hodeg would be my top scorer after four months I would buy you a one-way trip to the looney house.
No illusions we'll get into the promotion battle unless the leaders actually step up. The gap to the top in PPRD is already big enough, and unlike last year I'll settle for a low-10s position in the rankings.
Thanks for the update knockout, and all the reporters who knock out the races in fast pace!
Toms Skujins: 63 points. That pretty much sums up how the season is going for me so far.
Admittedly that is only from TRU and Strade Bianche, but still bloody awful. At least Wellens and Hoelgaard are doing alright. Given he's only ridden PTHC so far, Wellens should be more secure in definitely acquiring points in the latter half of the season, even if the potential totals are lower.
Ah well, the good news is I'll have a very obvious name for the chopping block when relegation arrives.
Actually really happy with this - we have the second least amount of race days used and a much much better PPRD than other teams around us which puts us around 16th if things stay the same. A few teams with padded pprd from early season results that will fall down the rankings too, so we're surprisingly in a really good place. Of our 4 leaders, Dunbar's raced once and Warchol hasn't even put our jersey on yet so *hopefully* there is still some good points for us to score.
So shit to see what is happening to Voyagin - a joke really. I hope the situation rectifies itself and they can hang on this season. Also, awesome to see Bralirwa riding high! Stallaert and Silvestre have been immense. Good to see Sauber doing really well too.
@Olfardh: So, I take it that Oomen's riding the ToA?
Really sad to see Kino being railed this hard, hopefully for Voyagin he can turn it around, when paired with Skuijns' scoring I think just becomes apparent how stacked hills was this year in PCT hopefully they manage to turn it around and outperform their PpRD, that's a team that doesn't belong in CT at all that's for sure.
Also getting fairly nervous with all this ToA talk, knowing that we'll face Novak and Warbasse and probably a bunch of other really strong climbers is going to be rought for our scoring options in our "GT" debut!
I'll never doubt you again mate In hindsight that was a bad take even just by my thoughts at the time, not sure why I did it but obviously I'm not pretending I saw anything near this coming Love to see the success you're having cunego and hope it continues
Have faith in Philips to turn it around, would really suck if they struggle again here after assembling a really good squad imo.
Spoiler
When I and others can get top half finishes with a similar level of leaders and general team makeup and dynamics, and then just because of minor stat differences PCM decides to screw certain riders and love others it really sucks and feels unfair, but nothing we can do about it of course.
24/02/21 - kandesbunzler said “I don't drink famous people."
15/08/22 - SotD said "Your [jandal's] humour is overrated"
11/06/24 - knockout said "Winning is fine I guess. Truth be told this felt completely unimportant." [PT] Xero Racing
We are doing a good job of maintaining our mid table position, just as long as the road keeps going up then we should easily stay up.
Our pprd has actually got better in this update so we might even be able to maintain our top 15 challenge but that is definitely a secondary goal to survival.
Our investment in depth seems to be paying off with 4 riders between 30th and 60th in the rankings so I'm glad that risk seems to be working out so far.
Apart from Barbados we've had a really good period from march through to this point in april. Saber did the three flat stage races and has come away with a good amount of points thanks to a great result in Baltic Chain. Alarcon raced only one race so far, but did well in Eritrea.
Beltran has been the surprise package as he seems to be back to his best. He seems to be benefiting from the better support around him and Pologne turned out to be a perfect race for his skill set. Nice to see him up there with the best in the individual rankings again. He won't keep scoring at the same pace because not every race will suit him as well as Pologne, but he could be in line for a 1000 pts
Apart from our three leaders we've had solid depth scoring from our other riders, especially the young ones. Pogacar has won two U25 jerseys and could be on course to score 100+ pts which is awesome to see Gaudu has also done a very nice job for Beltran. We have 15 riders who've scored points, a very nice team effort
9th is a really good position to be sitting in with about 1/3 of the season done. I don't think we'll stay up there, but I expected to be a lot closer to the relegation spots and I don't have to worry about that for the time being. We have a top 15 ranking goal and it looks very achievable at this moment. But the table looks very bunched up and there doesn't seem to be a team that is already looking relegated or a team that looks favoured to win, although Aker's ppRD is very impressive Some teams have already completed their C2 RDs, while some like me haven't even started. So ppRD will be affected by that.
