Career in Decline CQ game 2015

[Armchair cyclist]

The strategic analysis

In this game, even more than others, the expensive picks are the key ones. In the main game, a 0 pointer can score more than 1000 points (see JJ Cobo), in this, every rider has an upper limit to their value to the team, which is their cost.


The three most popular picks are also three of the most expensive (Gerrans, Peraud and Wiggins): which teams have thrown their teams hopes behind which of these riders, or the others chosen at a cost of more than twice the average spend per rider?

All three (Gerrans, Wiggins and Peraud)
Del1962 and The Sceptic

Gerrans and Wiggins
Gerraint Too Fast, Lenissart, Skidmark

Gerrans and Peraud
Al Pacino and Fauniera (also has Van Asbroeck)

Wiggins and Peraud
Alykaptan, Armchair Cyclist (I also have Rebellin) and Joelsim

Of those who only have one of the game's "big three":
Only Gerrans
Derrudi, DJSprtsch (also has Chavanel), Rote Laterne (has Rebellin and Finetto), Shalgo (Rebellin)
Only Wiggins
Leadbelly
Only Peraud
Akuryo

None of the main three (and therefore at the bottom of the popularity table):
JeroenK (has Rebellin), Josedin (Cancellara) and Flo (Finetto)

 

[Armchair cyclist]

Why am I always so unpopular

Ahhhh, there, there.

It says "Popularity of picks", not of manager; we love you really. It just means you are unique, or at least slightly eccentric in your choices.

 

[DJ Sprtsch]

I had Peraud last year, nothing could make me pick him again.
Well..maybe for 2016 after he has copied his 2014 season.

 

[shalgo]

It looks like I will rooting for Wiggins and Peraud this year and/or hoping that Wiggins keeps his race days to a minimum.

And it is good news that Airgas did not get invited to the Tour of California, assuming that Horner will still rack up enough race days in small events.

 

[rote_laterne]

I have probably been the first to uncover a fail, as Mancebo has already got about half of his 2014 points...

Yeah looks like a massive fail. But pretty fair of you not changing your team.

Finetto raced 7 days without scoring, Danielson made points but one less than last year.

Crawford scored 5 points in one day, Veikannen 5 points in six days like last year.

At least there's no big fail yet for me.

 

[shalgo]

Darn, a win for Cummings today. At least it is still fewer points so far than he got in the Dubai Tour last year.

 

[del1962]

Darn, a win for Cummings today. At least it is still fewer points so far than he got in the Dubai Tour last year.

Yep, good for Steve but bad for my team

 

[Armchair cyclist]

There is no point in trying to apply the 20 day rule at this stage of the game, but of the 175 riders selected, 39 already have some points. My unique pick of Mancebo is the only one who has amassed a large proportion of the total from last year. Cummings was a fairly popular pick, but has started far better than his managers in this game would have wanted him to.

Biggest scorers:
Name / CQ points / popularity
CUMMINGS Stephen 80 5
VISCONTI Giovanni 48 1
HANSEN Adam 46 1
MANCEBO PEREZ Francisco 37 1
ZAKARIN Ilnur 25 2
BOLE Grega 24 1
CANCELLARA Fabian 24 1
CRAVEN Dan 15 2
GALVIZ GARCIA Carlos Johan 15 1
BAK Lars Ytting 13 1
SBARAGLI Kristian 12 2
DUMOULIN Samuel 11 2
LAGUTIN Sergey 11 1

Fauniera, narrowly pipped for the win last year and with a very different tactic this year, is the only one to have held on to all his points so far, so holds the early lead.
Rank / Team / CQ points "won"
1 Fauniera 0
2 TheSceptic 7
3 Alykaptan 12
4 Lenissart 13
4 DJSprtsch 13
6 Skidmark 15
7 AlPacino 30
8 Leadbelly 35
9 RoteLaterne 36
10 GeraintTooFast 40
11 ArmchairCyclist 53
11 Akuryo 53
11 Josedin 53
14 Flo 60
15 Joelsim 88
15 Shalgo 88
17 Del1962 91
18 JeroenK 148
19 Derrudi 150

 

[rote_laterne]

I made it in the top half, hope to stay there till the end of the season.

Rebellin scored 8 point in 7 days but that's 8 points more than at this time last year. One race day more for Finetto and first race for Petacchi without scoring.

Craven made 15 points in 2 days, I don't think he'll be a good pick after all.

0 points so far for Knees and Pate in 4 days, you gotta love those sky doms. Same applies to Feng.

Briggs scored in 5 days at the Herald Sun Tour 4 points, Pellizotti made even 30.

Gerrans and Horner are yet to race.

 

[derrudi]

Well with Cummings, Bak, Hansen en S. Dumoulin it looks like I got all the points. Well, the season is still long as they say..

 

[skidmark]

With Witmitz scoring in a sprint and Wiggo in a Qatar possibly decided by a TT, I was getting worried, but Witmitz DNF'd and Wiggo is 10 minutes back. Way to perform, guys!

 

[the sceptic]

seems like Wiggins could manage to score 0 points this year.. hell, even if he somehow wins roubaix he'll still be a good pick.

 

[Armchair cyclist]

seems like Wiggins could manage to score 0 points this year.. hell, even if he somehow wins roubaix he'll still be a good pick.

So long as he keeps on riding unsuccessfully, rather than sitting races out.

 

[Geraint Too Fast]

Am I the first person with a rider into profit? Bloody Robinson Chalapud.

And Bazzana has started the year way too fast as well.

 

[shalgo]

seems like Wiggins could manage to score 0 points this year

It didn't take long for that prediction not to come true. But I am still worried about not picking him.

 

[rote_laterne]

Pellizotti is pretty successful. Bummer.

 

[shalgo]

This is not good news:

http://www.cyclingnews.com/news/airgas-safeways-season-delayed-by-vuelta-mexico-cancellation

I need Horner to get racing days, preferably in 2.2 races like this one would have been.

 

[rote_laterne]

This is not good news:

http://www.cyclingnews.com/news/airgas-safeways-season-delayed-by-vuelta-mexico-cancellation

I need Horner to get racing days, preferably in 2.2 races like this one would have been.

I second this.

 

[Armchair cyclist]

Still rather too early for applying the 20 day rule: still simply showing the unwanted points earned.

Riders this month
Doing better than their manager's want in February
GAVAZZI Francesco 168 points in February 1 team
JANSE VAN RENSBURG Jacques 154 1
TAARAM?E Rein 135 1
CHALAPUD GOMEZ Robinson Eduardo 100 1
BOLE Grega 95 1
PELLIZOTTI Franco 94 3
DUMOULIN Samuel 80 2

Already would be a good, in the black, pick if they had been in the other game:
JANSE VAN RENSBURG Jacques
MEGIAS LEAL Javier
MANCEBO PEREZ Francisco
CHALAPUD GOMEZ Robinson Eduardo
(red faces for Alykaptan, The Sceptic, Geraint Too Fast and yours truly)

Teams this month
Getting points here is what you don't want to do: those at the top of the table have riders with nothing to cheer about this month

1 Del1962 24
2 Lenissart 29
3 Shalgo 49
4 Joelsim 50
5 Skidmark 53
6 Leadbelly 55
7 Fauniera 84
8 JeroenK 86
9 Derrudi 96
10 DJSprtsch 152
11 ArmchairCyclist 153
12 AlPacino 155
13 TheSceptic 175
14 GeraintTooFast 192
15 Alykaptan 199
16 RoteLaterne 217
17 Flo 318
18 Akuryo 380
19 Josedin 413

Standings
Riders who have managed to keep well away from the podium so far this season will put a team at the top of this ranking:
1 Lenissart 42
2 Skidmark 68
3 Fauniera 84
4 Leadbelly 90
5 Del1962 115
6 Shalgo 137
7 Joelsim 138
8 DJSprtsch 165
9 TheSceptic 182
10 AlPacino 185
11 ArmchairCyclist 206
12 Alykaptan 211
13 GeraintTooFast 232
14 JeroenK 234
15 Derrudi 246
16 RoteLaterne 253
17 Flo 378
18 Akuryo 433
19 Josedin 466

 

[DJ Sprtsch]

Getting seriously worried about Pellizotti.
Afraid he's turning out to be my Peraud from last year.

 

[skidmark]

While Gerrans' injury in his first race back is unfortunate on the personal level, it makes it less likely that he'll have the Ardennes form of last year (and the points as well), and he definitely won't be back to claim a second San Remo. Wiggins getting 11th in the P-N prologue is good game-wise too. I really didn't know what to expect in terms of the Qatar race with a TT and Paris-Nice with a big prologue, but it looks like he's just all in for Roubaix and the rest is just fun, which is good news for his owners in this game. So far my only guy who has shown anything is Drucker, who I can only expect to have far fewer opportunities with BMC this year anyway.

 

[shalgo]

Bad news from T-A for those, like me, with Cummings. Good news for those with Wiggins that he dropped out before the final P-N TT.

 

[skidmark]

Re:

Bad news from T-A for those, like me, with Cummings. Good news for those with Wiggins that he dropped out before the final P-N TT.

Also the news that he's got special dispensation to ride the Tour de Yorkshire means that if he rides the 4 cobbled races he's supposed to and then the 3-day TdY, he'll be at 21 for the year

 

[fauniera]

Wiggins turns out to be a must pick unfortunately. He apparently isn't interested in anything than Roubaix, and i don't see him podium there either. There is not even a time trial at the Tour of Britain, which otherwise would have provided easy points for him if he would have been interested.

Also i'm not happy that Drucker is still riding all the little races (like Nokere Koerse today) instead of the big ones as he should with BMC.

 

[Armchair cyclist]

End of March

About 1/4 of selected riders have now reached the 20 day threshhold, and half of them have at least 15 racing days. Most of those who are on WT/PC teams are well on the way to 20, but the most significant rider short of days is Gerrans, the most popular pick of all, who has only one outing so far.

Unwanted points this month:
CANCELLARA Fabian 208 points 1 team
PERAUD Jean-Christophe 185 8
POELS Wout 168 1
POURSEYEDI GOLAKHOUR Mirsamad 146 1
CUMMINGS Stephen 125 5
GATTO Oscar 125 1
CHAVANEL Sylvain 113 1
DRUCKER Jempy 103 2
KREUZIGER Roman 102 1
BOLE Grega 97 1
PONZI Simone 92 1
MANCEBO PEREZ Francisco 77 1
REBELLIN Davide 71 4
LEUKEMANS Björn 55 2
JANSE VAN RENSBURG Jacques 51 1
bozic borut 50 1
CIOLEK Gerald 49 1
HAYMAN Mathew 48 1
GERDEMANN Linus 47 1
PELLIZOTTI Franco 45 3


Best scoring riders in the game:
PERAUD Jean-Christophe 1014 8
CHAVANEL Sylvain 889 1
CANCELLARA Fabian 761 1
VAN ASBROECK Tom 718 1
FINETTO Mauro 614 2
WIGGINS Bradley 603 9
VAN GENECHTEN Jonas 506 1
REBELLIN Davide 503 4
HESJEDAL Ryder 492 2
DRUCKER Jempy 443 2
LEUKEMANS Björn 425 2
VANENDERT Jelle 419 1
VOECKLER Thomas 358 4
DUMOULIN Samuel 339 2
KOREN Kristjan 338 3
TEN DAM Laurens 326 1
KIRYIENKA Vasil 324 1
KREUZIGER Roman 322 1
BOLE Grega 305 1
LAGUTIN Sergey 304 1

(To clarify: Peraud has 18 race days, had a 2014 score of 1312 and a 2015 score of 185. 1312-185=1127, and 18/20 of 1127 is 1014.3, or 1014 to nearest whole number.)

Standings
The first table with real scores, and top three scorers for each team)
1 Joelsim 3710 (Peraud, Wiggins, Voeckler)
2 Flo 3534 (Finetto, Hesjedal, Kiryienka)
3 Akuryo 3483 (Peraud, Hesjedal, Voeckler)
4 Josedin 3386 (Cancellara, Leukemans, Voeckler)
5 ArmchairCyclist 3272 (Peraud, Wiggins, Rebellin)
6 JeroenK 3145 (Rebellin, Leukemans, Koren)
7 Leadbelly 2968 (Wiggins, Van Genechten, Koren)
8 Alykaptan 2530 (Peraud, Wiggins, Gradek (237))
9 AlPacino 2468 (Peraud, Vanendert, Henderson (192))
10 Del1962 2419 (Peraud, Wiggins, Morabito (245))
11 Derrudi 2396 (Voeckler, Dumoulin, Bozic (229))
12 Fauniera 2325 (Peraud, Van Asbroeck, Drucker)
13 Lenissart 2239 (Wiggins, Koren, Steegmans (220))
14 TheSceptic 2163 (Peraud, Wiggins, Belda (150))
15 DJSprtsch 2051 (Chavanel, Pellizotti (253), Tvetcov (227))
16 RoteLaterne 2010 (Finetto, Rebellin, Pellizotti)
17 Shalgo 1991 (Rebellin, Zubeldia (249), Steegmans)
18 Skidmark 1925 (Wiggns, Drucker, Belda)
19 GeraintTooFast 1679 (Wiggins, Zakarin (291), Carthy (164))