mariposa wrote:I'd much rather have a wild card team that
wants to be there, than a WT team that
has to be there.
I completely agree. It used to really annoy me when the old incarnation of Direct Energie had an automatic invite to La Vuelta as a top tier team. They rarely sent their top riders and never looked bothered about being there, often ending up with only a small part of the team by the end of the race. I was really pleased that their wildcard invite was refused when they had to apply! Give me a keen pro Conti team over a reluctant World Tour one any day.[/quote]
It's always like that. A lot of WT teams are bringing to the giro their b teams without having any ambition every year for example, but in most of the WT races there are reluctant teams: does Movistar really need/want/deserve to be in all the cobbled classics (Omloop, Harelbeke, Dwars, Gent, RvV, P-R) with 0 ambitions ever for a top 5? Does Lotto Soudal need/want to be at the Tour of the Basque Coutry while the holy week is going on in Belgium? It's the WT system which is sick and illogic, only a few teams have the resources/capacity to be competitive during all the WT calendar, the Wildcards are a free decision of the organizers; it's their freedom to chose who they want considering that they are already obligated by the UCI to accept 18 teams. This brings us to a reflection on the sense of the "Professionals" category: their level is falling down year by year, all the big riders are in the WT.
A few years ago there were Professionals like:
- LPR: had riders like Di Luca (ok, it's controversial but he was a more than serious Giro D'Italia contender) and Petacchi at their disposal
-Androni had Scarponi who fought for the final victory in the 2010 Giro finishing 4th
-BMC at the begining was a Professional
-Same for Cervelo
-Aqua&Sapone had Garzelli, capable of winning a MTT, the best climber jersey and a top10 spot at the Giro
Which professional has today riders capable to fight for victory in the biggest races? Only Fortuneo (Barguil), maybe
The level of the professionals has dropped and is continuing dropping: The only healthy professionals are the french ones (not all the french professionals) which are sure to ride the TdF (the biggest race) and all the other ASO races without having to race all the WT calendar. But it means that only 4-5 professionals have a reason to exist, all the other are practically slightly better continentals, the UCI should ask itself if this category has still a reason to exist.
Aqua Blue is already racing a lot in the World Tour, more than the vast majority of the other professionals, so their manager has probably not understood how the system works outside the WT if he pretend to be invited in the biggest races thanks to Denifl and Werbasse.
Their results this year have been very mediocre, if they want to go to the Tour/Vuelta/Giro they should hire a rider that the organizers would like to see.