Today, the official website for Pro Cycling Manager 2007 was opened. It doesn't bring much new (except for the PSP-screenshots, that is), but these are the main points on the website:
" You participate in the true Tour de France 2007 and take part in all of the season’s big competitions.
An updated and improved database! More than 1500 cyclists, 180 races (Tours or traditional), and 520 stages.
Realistic management of a cyclist manager’s career. Gain experience throughout years and competitions, manage aspects of human relationships, training, finances, etc.
Direct the largest professional teams. A total of 61 official teams are available (Rabobank, Quickstep, Discovery Channel, CSC, etc.).
New gameplay possibilities reinforce the tactical aspect of the races with the introduction of the “observe” mode, Gruppetto, etc. The Artificial Intelligence of competitors is improved so as to offer behaviours that vary by objectives, situations, and needs. Get ready for even more competition this year!
Includes a race editor to create and modify your own 3D stages.
Playable in single-player and/or multi-player, up to 20 players over the Internet or a LAN: Simple Race mode, Tour mode, and Season mode."
The very first screenshots of the PSP-version have been released to the public. In these screenshots we can both see the management menu and the in-game screenshots. Have a look at them in our Screenshots-section: http://www.pcmdaily.com/photogallery.php?album_id=7
The Giro has started, but in the world of PCM that's not our primary focus ;) Instead, we want to hear much more about the upcoming game, but it has unfortunately been a quite uneventfull week.
Awesome feature in PSP-game Okay, this might just be me, but when translating the PSP-version, Pro Cycling 2007 as it is called, I noticed a fantastic feature which the PC-community has requested for a very long time. This is what the English translation (made by Cyanide) says: "The rider will go to the back of the group to pick up ""refreshments"". Each rider starts a race with 2 feeds, but as they drink regularly during a race it is possible for a rider to find himself with an empty bottle. When this happens a rider's info box will blink blue and as long as he is not refreshed there will be a negative impact on energy consumption.
When a rider heads to the back of the group to pick up ""feeds"" he will take enough for all team mates in the group. He will then work his way back up through the group and hand out the ""feeds"" to all those who need them at that moment (those with 1 bottle or less).
Be careful not to send a rider back to look for refreshments at a bad moment (a mountain climb, a succession of hills, ....) because it may be nigh on impossible for him to work his way back up through the group. Feeding is therefore highly strategic and must be planned ahead."
So, another step closer to reality! Basically, the above means that it's now possible to go back to back of the peloton and collect bottles for both the rider and his team mates. Before, in the PC-version, you had around 4 bottles (depending on the length of the race), and you wouldn't have to drop back in the peloton to collect bottles at any point. As said, the above is from the PSP-translation, so I have no idea if the same feature will be present in the PC-version.
Beta test, phase two Last week, I said that the beta tests had started which surprised many who thought they all would be invited to the beta tests. Well, I asked Freire about this, and he told me that they would have two beta phases. The first one started last week (the one mentioned in the Weekly News) while the 2nd one won't start before the start of this week (probably tomorrow). The 2nd one will also include more people than the 1st one, and this includes translators, new beta-testers, etc..
So, good luck to all who have applied!
World Championship - now, we have a winner I mentioned last week that a winner had been found, but as said in the correction, the World Championship wasn't even over at that time. A winner have been found now, and luckily for us, it was the one we "predicted" last week. A-Davis won ahead of Hush_WC while Stunt lost his 3rd place to Ciclopolizzi.
Congratulations - once and for all - to the winners.
Scandinavian website opened Back in the old Cycling Manager 1-days (yes, before the game was renamed to "Pro Cycling Manager), Scandinavian Online League (aka Cycling Manager.dk) was the most known CyM-ressource - not just for Scandinavians, but definitely also for the rest of the English-speaking community. A lot has happened since then - almost every language has its own website, but that has not stopped a group of people from starting PCMScandinavia.
The site is mainly in Danish at the moment, but some parts are also translated to Norwegian. No parts of the website are in English, though. You can pay it a visit http://www.pcmscandinavia.com .
Two new downloads Since most of us are waiting for Pro Cycling Manager 2007 we don't see that many new downloads. The past week, we did find two new, though. The first one is an update for the Stanosbase. The new update was scheduled and includes the promised stats update. It also ensures that the transfers are totally up to date (f.e. Jörg Jaksche at Tinkoff). The update requires the V1-version of the DB, too. Both can be found in our Downloads section.
The 2nd one is a background showing pictures of Team CSC. Since many of our users are Danish, that will probably a popular download ;)
No database converters for PCM 2007 ... yet Beta testers have reported that neither PCM Kicker Lite nor the converters work with PCM 2007. The maker of PCMKicker, the most advanced editing tool for PCM, Impish has already started building a so-called PCM Kicker New Generation which will work with PCM 2007.
About the databases, it's worth mentioning that the .cdb-format will stay (which was confirmed in our exclusive interview with Clément Pinget). Rumours had said that Cyanide would change format, but that is not the case.
Donations are welcome Repeat from last week We have currently received 0 donations. That is of course fine, but it also require us to be creative when finding space for the PCM 2007-files. With that I mean that we will have to remove most of our 2006-files when PCM 2007 is released and the files for that version starts being released. For us, having both is preferred, but since we are close to be out of space, and since I have limited money resources, donations are very welcome.
You can donate by clicking the "Paypal Donate"-button. You can pay with credit cards or through Paypal.
Welcome to the trial edition of a weekly cycling news update! This is where we'll summarise all that's gone on in the past week of Cycling.
Doping Unfortunately, there's little else to start out with than this week's biggest news story concering Ivan Basso. Basso has finally revealed that he is Birillo, only time will tell what will happen to him. Another italian, Michele Scarponi has also confessed to being 'Zapatero'. Today brough us another revelation, this time from Floyd Landis. No, he hasn't admitted yet but he now claims he was offered to have a very small sentence if he was to give USADA incriminating evidence on Lance Armstrong.
Tour de Romandie Onto the real cycling and the final preparation for the Giro concluded this week - the Tour de Romandie. Paolo Savoldelli won the prologue and led in the early stages before losing the lead to American Chris Horner, in perhaps the crucial stage. The stage was won by Igor Anton, but second placed Thomas Dekker needn't have worried as he won the final stage time trial to take overall success. 1 Thomas Dekker (Ned) Rabobank 17.27.02 2 Paolo Savoldelli (Ita) Astana 0.11 3 Andrey Kashechkin (Kaz) Astana 0.34 4 Cadel Evans (Aus) Predictor - Lotto 0.43 5 Chris Horner (USA) Predictor - Lotto 0.46
4 Jours de Dunkerque The peculiarly named 4 days of Dunkirk, is a 2.HC category race that began this week. The 6-day event began with a short Prologue, and Brit Bradley Wiggins took advantage of the weather conditions to take victory. Piotr Zielinski and David Boucher held off the pack in Stage 2 as Zielinski took the stage as Boucher claimed the overall lead. The Scheldeprijs Vlaanderen champion Mark Cavendish took the honour in a sprint finish for Stage 3, and the runner-up on that day took victory in Stage 4: Gert Steegmens. Frenchman William Bonnet now leads, with 2 stages to go.
Giro di San Marino This weeks biggest Women's race was controlled by World Champion Marianne Vos. She won the opening time trial and went on to win the sprints of the remaining 2 stages for a comprehensive victory.
Other Races Juan Jose Haedo warmed up for the Giro beating Dane Alex Rasmussen at the danish Colliers Classic. In Italy, the GP Larciano and Giro di Toscana were won by Vincenzo Nibali and in Spain the mountainous 5-day race Vuelta a Asturias was one by Spaniard Koldo Gil.
After a pretty hectic week in the world of (real) cycling, sit down and relax by reading last week's most important news :)
.. and the world champion is .. After a close final, the World Champion in Pro Cycling Manager 06/07 has been found. A-Davis won with 284 points ahead of Hush_WC who had 274 points. Third place was _Stunt. All in all, 12 people participated in the finals. A-Davis will receive a version of Pro Cycling Manager 07/08 as 1st prize.
Congratulations to him and the runner-ups.
[Edit] I have just been let known that the finals are actually not over yet. Two days of gaming are still left. I'm sorry for the misunderstanding.
Danish site to be closed? Roumours are saying that the largest Danish PCM-site, PCMGeeks.dk, will be closed down soon. No reasons for the drastic decision has been given, but it might be due to the fact that a new Danish website is underway and already now has been able to capture a few of the "prominent" crew members of PCMGeeks.
According to the roumours, the site will be closed on the 6th of June 2007 - exactly one year after the opening.
Beta tests have started Another unconfirmed roumour is that the beta tests of PCM 2007 have started. A few members who used to be beta testers and translators have not received any invites, though. And being a translator without being able to try the translation out in-game seems unlikely.
We will follow up on the story.
Donations are welcome We have currently received 0 donations. That is of course fine, but it also require us to be creative when finding space for the PCM 2007-files. With that I mean that we will have to remove most of our 2006-files when PCM 2007 is released and the files for that version starts being released. For us, having both is preferred, but since we are close to be out of space, and since I have limited money resources, donations are very welcome.
You can donate by clicking the "Paypal Donate"-button. You can pay with credit cards or through Paypal. During the coming time, we will focus more on this.
You participate in the true Tour de France 2007 and take part in all of the season’s big competitions. 
