2019 Spring Classics CQ Game

[Armchair Cyclist]

Race 19/21: Fleche Wallonne

The best Ardennes riders tend to be very expensive for their returns within this game. Having said that, Bjorn Lambrecht would have been a lot cheaper and yielded a lot more points than many of those that were selected by the managers here with these races in mind.

VANENDERT Jelle 9th, 52 pts for Comodoro and Scrool07
GASPAROTTO Enrico 10th, 46 for Mellow Velo and Otoxiep87
COSNEFROY Benoit 12th, 35 for Safebet
WELLENS Tim 17th, 19 for Just Some Guy
and 8 five pointers

Comodoro has been at the bottom of the table for some time, so good that he gets a moment in the sunlight.
1 Comodoro 62 (80 Green points)
2 Scrool07 52 (50)
3 MellowVelo 51 (35)
4 Otoxiep87 46 (25)
5 Safebet 45 (15)
6 JustSomeGuy 24 (10)
7 AmisVelo 15 (5)
8 Armchair, BlackBandit222, Bminchow, Del1962, Josedin, LightBing 10 (1 each)
14 Chiron, Flo, GPBlanco, Joelsim, Leadbelly, LosBrolin, Nathanptz, PremierAndrew, RoteLaterne, Salvarani, ThePirate81, Tobydawq, Triley36, Vladimir 5
28 The rest 0
SoLastYear 0
CollectiveWisdom 10

Green Points

Otoxiep is up from 10th to 6th, and Scrool breaks into the top ten.

1 Tobydawq 436.05
2 Chiron 339.62
3 Joelsim 288.16
4 ThePirate81 206.32
5 JustSomeGuy 185.13
6 Otoxiep87 178.63
7 Madrazo 174.42
8 Bminchow 165.5
9 Leadbelly 161.54
10 Scrool07 157.04

Standings

Something of a stalemate, with no-one in the top 7 scoring more than 5 points. Del1962 moving from 14th to 13th was the only change above the bottom 7 places: down there, Mellow Velo somehow finds a 2 place "leap".

1 Tobydawq 3160
2 Chiron 2534
3 ThePirate81 2365
4 Madrazo 2326
5 PremierAndrew 2298
6 Joelsim 2287
7 SemirS 2167
8 AmisVelo 2116
9 Search 2075
10 Armchair 1844
11 Leadbelly 1726
12 Triley36 1705
13 Del1962 1693
14 Blues_in_the_Bottle 1687
15 Laarsland 1620
16 Otoxiep87 1615
17 LightBing 1548
18 Kazistuta 1529
19 Salvarani 1464
20 Flo 1449
21 Scrool07 1445
22 Josedin 1306
23 Bminchow 1223
24 LosBrolin 1212
25 JustSomeGuy 1151
26 RoteLaterne 1083
27 Nathanptz 1062
28 Vladimir 992
29 Safebet 987
30 BlackBandit222 981
31 MellowVelo 914
32 GPBlanco 900
33 Postmanhat 873
34 Comodoro 756
35 NorthAmericanScum 750
SoLastYear 419
CollectiveWisdom 1655

It is very possible that the Liege and Frankfurt races are not much more influential in the game.

Dropbox Spreadsheet

 

[Armchair Cyclist]

Race 20/21: Liege-Bastogne-Liege

This has been important for the game in the past, and there was some evidence of Ardennes friendly riders in some of the teams submitted, but none that have really featured when the racing got going.

GAUDU David 5th, 100 pts for Comodoro
WELLENS Tim 11th, 54 for Just Some Guy
BAKELANTS Jan 30th, 6 for LightBing, Premier Andrew and Vladimir
and just 8 of the 71 five pointers.

Comodoro, in the tradition of Kubler, Argentin, Rebellin, Valverde and Gilbert, does the Belgian Ardennes double..

1 Comodoro 100 80 Green points
2 JustSomeGuy 59 50 pts
3 LightBing 11 35 pts
4 Armchair, BlackBandit222, LosBrolin, MellowVelo, Safebet, ThePirate81 10 10 each
10 PremierAndrew, Vladimir 6 0.5 each
12 AmisVelo, Bminchow, Chiron, Del1962, Joelsim, Josedin, Leadbelly, Nathanptz, Search, Tobydawq, Triley36 5
23 The rest 0
CollectiveWisdom 5

Green points

Early challenger JSG moves up one to 4th, and Armchair Cyclist appears at the foot of the top ten. Comodoro had 1/26th of a point last Sunday, and is only just outside the top ten now.

1 Tobydawq 436.05
2 Chiron 339.62
3 Joelsim 288.16
4 JustSomeGuy 235.13
5 ThePirate81 216.32
6 Otoxiep87 178.63
7 Madrazo 174.42
8 Bminchow 165.5
9 Leadbelly 161.54
10 Armchair 161.42

Standings

No changes in position at all.

1 Tobydawq 3165
2 Chiron 2539
3 ThePirate81 2375
4 Madrazo 2326
5 PremierAndrew 2304
6 Joelsim 2292
7 SemirS 2167
8 AmisVelo 2121
9 Search 2080
10 Armchair 1854
11 Leadbelly 1731
12 Triley36 1710
13 Del1962 1698
14 Blues_in_the_Bottle 1687
15 Laarsland 1620
16 Otoxiep87 1615
17 LightBing 1559
18 Kazistuta 1529
19 Salvarani 1464
20 Flo 1449
21 Scrool07 1445
22 Josedin 1311
23 Bminchow 1228
24 LosBrolin 1222
25 JustSomeGuy 1210
26 RoteLaterne 1083
27 Nathanptz 1067
28 Vladimir 998
29 Safebet 997
30 BlackBandit222 991
31 MellowVelo 924
32 GPBlanco 900
33 Postmanhat 873
34 Comodoro 856
35 NorthAmericanScum 750
SoLastYear 419
CollectiveWisdom 1660

It all ends on Wednesday in Frankfurt, although looking at the startlist, I am not expecting it to make much difference.

 

[Armchair Cyclist]

Race 21/21: Eschborn-Frankfurt and the final stage of the game.

A few of our chosen riders still finding some points:

PLANCKAERT Baptiste 6th, 62pts for 4 teams
NAESEN Lawrence 8th, 46 for 2
BOASSON HAGEN Edvald 14th, 22 for 1
NAESEN Oliver 16th, 18 for 1
CORT NIELSEN MAGNUS 18th, 14 for 1
plus 8 five pointers

1 LosBrolin, Madrazo 67 (Planckaert and a fiver, 65 Green points each)
3 AmisVelo, Scrool07 62 (Planckaert but no fiver, 30 Green points each)
5 Laarsland 56 (L Naesen and 2 fivers, 15 G pts)
6 Tobydawq 46 (10)
7 Del1962 32 (5)
8 SemirS 18 (3)
9 Chiron 14 (2)
10 Josedin, JustSomeGuy, LightBing, Vladimir 10 (0.25 each)
14 Armchair, Comodoro, GPBlanco, Leadbelly, Nathanptz, Otoxiep87, Postmanhat, PremierAndrew, RoteLaterne, Safebet, Salvarani, Search, ThePirate81, Triley36 5
29 Everyone else 0
SoLastYear 5
CollectiveWisdom 0

Green points

Madrazo makes a late jump to 4th in this category, and Laarsland and Scrool07 do enough to get into the top ten at the last. The top two, as in the main game, have not really been in question for some time.


1 Tobydawq 446.05
2 Chiron 341.62
3 Joelsim 288.16
4 Madrazo 239.42
5 JustSomeGuy 235.38
6 ThePirate81 216.32
7 Scrool07 187.04
8 Otoxiep87 178.63
9 Laarsland 172
10 Bminchow 165.5
11 Leadbelly 161.54
12 Armchair 161.42
13 Comodoro 160.04
14 LightBing 157.29
15 LosBrolin 156
16 SemirS 154.02
17 AmisVelo 132.75
18 Search 128.02
19 PremierAndrew 117.42
20 Blues_in_the_Bottle 83.18
21 Safebet 81
22 Kazistuta 80.04
23 Del1962 59.35
24 BlackBandit222 59.07
25 MellowVelo 57.54
26 Nathanptz 45.04
27 Josedin 43.32
28 Salvarani 36.04
29 NorthAmericanScum 30.61
30 Postmanhat 25.5
31 Triley36 24.02
32 GPBlanco 15.04
33 RoteLaterne 7.54
34 Vladimir 5.79
35 Flo 1.54

Final standings

Only 4 teams moved up at all today, and while Scrool07 was the only one to manage a two place jump, far more significant was Madrazo's move to take the final step on the podium.

1 Tobydawq 3211
2 Chiron 2553
3 Madrazo 2393
4 ThePirate81 2380
5 PremierAndrew 2309
6 Joelsim 2292
7 SemirS 2185
8 AmisVelo 2183
9 Search 2085
10 Armchair 1859
11 Leadbelly 1736
12 Del1962 1730
13 Triley36 1715
14 Blues_in_the_Bottle 1687
15 Laarsland 1676
16 Otoxiep87 1620
17 LightBing 1569
18 Kazistuta 1529
19 Scrool07 1507
20 Salvarani 1469
21 Flo 1449
22 Josedin 1321
23 LosBrolin 1289
24 Bminchow 1228
25 JustSomeGuy 1220
26 RoteLaterne 1088
27 Nathanptz 1072
28 Vladimir 1008
29 Safebet 1002
30 BlackBandit222 991
31 MellowVelo 924
32 GPBlanco 905
33 Postmanhat 878
34 Comodoro 861
35 NorthAmericanScum 755
SoLastYear 424
CollectiveWisdom 1660

Congratulations to Tobydawq, who really has set a new standard for the game with a phenomenal score, to Chiron for what would, under other circumstances, have been a dominant and record breaking win, and to everyone who can claim to have had some sort of a victory, if only over their own expectations.
Thanks to all who have taken part, and/or followed the updates.

I should manage some number crunching later this evening.

 

[Armchair Cyclist]

564 different riders scored in at least one of these 21 races (although 26 of those among our selectionsfailed to do so). The 18 highest scorers got more than 300:

VAN DER POEL Mathieu 901pts 13 teams
ALAPHILIPPE Julian 892 0
FUGLSANG Jakob 632 0
STYBAR Zdenek 573 3
NAESEN Oliver 546 1
KRISTOFF Alexander 542 0
BETTIOL Alberto 444 17
VAN AVERMAET Greg 443 1
ACKERMANN Pascal 428 0
VAN AERT Wout 418 15
POLITT Nils 400 1
GILBERT Philippe 396 3
LAMPAERT Yves 387 3
SCHACHMANN Maximilian 376 0
JUNGELS Bob 373 0
MATTHEWS Michael 319 0
SAGAN Peter 315 0
TRENTIN Matteo 301 15



28 of them yielded a profit (they got more points in these few weeks than in the whole of last year), although only a small number did so by more than a handful of points:

BETTIOL Alberto 394 points profit 17 teams
VAN DER POEL Mathieu 362 13
HALLER Marco 119 0
NAESEN Lawrence 105 2
DE GREEF Robbert (RIP) 57 0
LANGEVELD Sebastian 43 6
ROWE Luke 35 25
BOECKMANS KRIS 35 1
CLARKE Simon 29 0
SHALUNOV Evgeny 29 0
VAKOC Petr 20 15
VERGAERDE Otto 19 0
DE VREESE Laurens 17 1
SCHWARZMANN Michael 16 0
GABBURO Davide 13 0
CIMOLAI Davide 10 0
EISEL Bernhard 10 2
GAREL Adrien 10 0
MATHIS Marco 6 0
CARVALHO Andre Rodrigues 6 0
BAGIOLI Andrea 5 0
VERWILST Aaron 5 0
SIX Franklin 5 0
TIMMERMANS Justin 5 0
LEROUX Samuel 5 0
DE VRIES Hartthijs 5 0
SCHELLING Ide 2 0
PETIT Adrien 1 1

4 of these return an infinite percentage return, as their cost was 0 (Vakoc, Garel, Leroux, De Vries), but for the remainder of those in profit, their percentage return is:
VERGAERDE Otto 2000.0
BETTIOL Alberto 888.0
DE GREEF Robbert 311.1
NAESEN Lawrence 305.9
HALLER Marco 295.1
SHALUNOV Evgeny 261.1
CARVALHO Andre Rodrigues 220.0
EISEL Bernhard 200.0
VERWILST Aaron 200.0
SIX Franklin 200.0
TIMMERMANS Justin 200.0
BOECKMANS KRIS 183.3
VAN DER POEL Mathieu 167.2
MATHIS Marco 154.5
ROWE Luke 150.0
DE VREESE Laurens 139.5
LANGEVELD Sebastian 132.3
GABBURO Davide 125.5
SCHWARZMANN Michael 121.3
CLARKE Simon 112.0
CIMOLAI Davide 111.4
SCHELLING Ide 110.0
BAGIOLI Andrea 107.5
PETIT Adrien 100.6



The Impeccable Picks (you could not get more points from a cheaper rider) are:
VAN DER POEL Mathieu
BETTIOL Alberto
DE GREEF Robbert
SHALUNOV Evgeny
VAKOC Petr



The best possible team that I find on a brief shuffling of numbers is:

FUGLSANG Jakob 1045 cost 632 points earned
STYBAR Zdenek 724 573
VAN DER POEL Mathieu 539 901
CLARKE Simon 242 271
LANGEVELD Sebastian 133 176
ROWE Luke 70 105
HALLER Marco 61 180
NAESEN Lawrence 51 156
BETTIOL Alberto 50 444
BOECKMANS KRIS 42 77
DE GREEF Robbert 27 84
VAKOC Petr 0 20
for a total of 3619, but my first attempt at calculating this is nearly always surpassed when others turn their attention to it: please let me know if you find better.



Embarrassing errors could be defined in a number of ways: these are those who cost at least the average budget per rider, and were selected (with the number of teams that selected him) but scored less than 10% of their cost.
BOASSON HAGEN Edvald 1
DUNBAR Eddie 1
FELLINE Fabio 6
HAIG Jack 1
KITTEL Marcel 7
KREUZIGER Roman 2
MOSCON Gianni 1
VALGREN ANDERSEN Michael 1
VAN DER HOORN Taco 3
VAN SCHIP Jan-Willem 1 (I had three of them!)



Tobydawq's winning team: (name/cost/score)
STYBAR Zdenek 724 573
VAN AERT Wout 597 418
TRENTIN Matteo 581 301
VAN DER POEL Mathieu 539 901
LANGEVELD Sebastian 133 176
VANDENBERGH Stijn 105 62
STANNARD Ian 103 35
ROWE Luke 70 105
NAESEN Lawrence 51 156
BETTIOL Alberto 50 444
BOOM Lars 37 20
VAKOC Petr 0 20

2990 3211


The 13 teams who chose Van Der Poel are all in the top 14 places: Leadbelly in 11th is the only impostor in that group of Mathieuphiles. Selecting Bettiol kept his teams out of the bottom third at least, and SemirS in 7th was the highest placed without him.



Some races, inevitably, contributed more to the game than others:

Ronde van Vlaanderen 9370 points granted to teams 16.8% of the total scored
E3 6724 12.1
Paris-Roubaix 6245 11.2
Dwars 5564 10.0
Gent-Wevelegem 3959 7.1
Amstel 3934 7.1
Omloop 3571 6.4
Milan-San Remo 3566 6.4
Brabantse Pijl 2889 5.2
Strade Bianche 2643 4.7
Denain 1838 3.3
De Panne 1295 2.3
KBK 866 1.6
Nokere 846 1.5
Handzame 585 1.1
Frankfurt 539 1.0
Scheldeprijs 471 0.8
Fleche 425 0.8
LBL 297 0.5
Drenthe 52 0.1
GP Industria 0 0.0


Hereis the spreadsheet: please do share any other interesting findings.

And keep an eye out for the Giro game: I hope to do an initial launch posting tomorrow, but entries should really be held back until prices for that one are set on Monday.

 

[tobydawq]

Thanks for organising the game! It has been much fun taking part of. Sorry if my participation ruined the game for others