The 2016 CQ Ranking Manager Thread

[GP Blanco]

Barguil, Martin, Péraud, Kelderman and Valgren Andersen scored my points this week. I am disappointed with Gerrans and Martin in LBL, I expected more than 10 points in total of these two riders. On the other hand Barguil was strong this week.

Tour of Turkey
ROSON GARCIA Jaime

The GC field is not that strong. I am expecting a GC top-10.

Tour de Romandie
LÓPEZ MORENO Miguel Ángel
LUTSENKO Alexey
VAN GARDEREN Tejay
FORMOLO Davide
KUDUS GHEBREMEDHIN Merhawi
CONTRERAS PINZON Rodrigo
DE PLUS Laurens
KITTEL Marcel
VERVAEKE Louis
BETANCUR GOMEZ Carlos Alberto
GERRANS Simon
HAIG Jack
KELDERMAN Wilco
MARTIN Guillaume

With Kelderman, Van Garderen and López some guys who could make the top-10. Formolo, Vervaeke and Kudus to make the top-20. The others can surprise me. In the sprints Gerrans and Kittel although the profiles look too hard for the latter.

Tour de Yorkshire
MEZGEC Luka
YATES Adam
BARGUIL Warren

Barguil to continue his Ardennes shape. Hopefully Yates will be better than last week. Mezgec will be a lead-out.

Rund um den Finanzplatz Eschborn-Frankfurt
MARTIN Tony
GAVIRIA RENDON Fernando
NERZ Dominik
KÄMNA Lennard
DEGAND Thomas

What will Gaviria do in his first race after his break?

 

[skidmark]

Update #15: yoyokt rockets straight up the standings as Nicosix holds on at the top

The Ardennes and Trentino were the big draws this week, and with the big scorers like Poels and Valverde not picked by any teams, there were some teams with a good cluster of pretty rare picks that made it to the top of the charts.

This Week's Top Scorers

Rank Team Points this week
1 yoyokt 877
2 Eric10 727
3 18-Valve. (pithy) 631
4 Squire 606
5 adamski101 599

There's no yo-yoing for yoyokt this week; there is mere domination and movement straight to the top of the charts. Kangert (2 teams), Barguil, Konrad (3 teams) and Dan Martin all score over 100 points for their team, with support (over 40 points) from Jeannesson, Niemec and Zoidl. A dominant week. Second place Eric 10 had both Barguil and Martin, but got other points from Alaphillipe and Zakarin. Third place 18-Valve, meanwhile, also had Dan Martin, but got big points from Trentino winner Landa and Diego Rosa.

This Week's High Movers

Rank Team Up/down
1 yoyokt (+38)
2 Eric10 (+27)
3 18-Valve. (pithy) (+26)
4 Squire (+20)
5 Kjellus (+19)

Pretty much the same list as above, with 6th-in-points Kjellus moving up 1 spot on this list. It won't quite get a mention in the top 10 overall section, but Kjellus and Squire used their hefty hauls this week to vault to 11th and 12th place overall, within touching distance of the top 10.

Green Jersey Competition

Rank Team Total
1 Pentacycle 116
2 Nicosix 100
3 tom_jelte 93
4 Emericlabordure 90
5 LaFlorecita 87
5 ironted 87

No movement in the top 5 this week, and only one team (Eric10 moving into 9th place overall) scored any points in the top 10. A few new teams in the top 15 for the week, and now 116 teams have scored at least a point in the competition.

Polka Dot Jersey Competition

Rank Team Points
1 Eric10 57
2 tom_jelte 49
3 Emericlabordure 45
3 LosBrolin 45
5 RoudeLeiw 44

A second big jump in a row from Eric10 vaults their team from 7th overall in this competition last week to becoming the new leader! Kjellus and Squire move into the top 10 overall, but not quite the top 5. 90 teams have scored at least a point in this competition.

Top 10 Overall

Rank Up/down Team Points
1 (-) Nicosix 6236
2 (-) LaFlorecita 6138
3 (-) Falze 5948
4 (+1) skidmark 5904
5 (-1) jeroenk 5857
6 (+3) greenedge 5830
7 (+6) Ferminal 5782
8 (-2) Geraint Too Fast 5777
9 (+3) Pentacycle 5698
10 (-3) shalgo 5668

As noted above, there were some great jumps just below the top 10, but Ferminal is really the only big mover in the top 10 this week, coming back into it in 7th place. Interesting at the top though - LaFlorecita closed the gap to Nicosix by over 200 points for the week, and is only 98 behind. With the other teams quite a bit below, can she close the gap fully next week? Aside from Ferminal, the Kittel-less Pentacycle has a good week to get back in the top 10, whereas Hugo Koblet and karaev fall out.

Spreadsheet at dropbox

 

[Gigs_98]

Considering how bad Kwiat was (before the season I expected him to at least ride FW and to definitely fight for the win in LBL) place 16 for the week is definitely good. I fear a little letdown net week because I don't have TJVG but in the giro it should be good for me with Landa for the gc and Kittel, Demare and Ewan for the sprints. I still hope for a top 100 placing at the end

 

[Jancouver]

Damn, I thought the slide was reversed last week but today I lost everything I gained last week. I just can't catch a break.

Thanks for the update!

 

[escartin]

that's better, 24th on the week and gloriously into the top 140

mainly thanks to Rosa and Barguil. and if Trek knew how to do even a semi-competent TTT, then Zoidl and Arredondo could have vaulted me even higher.

despite my lowly position I am not too disappointed with my team. the low points are Amador (I seriously don't understand what was going thru my mind when I picked him ) and Dombrowski (any news on what he is actually going to do this year?). Ciolek, Arredondo and Meintjes are not exactly setting the world alight yet either this year but I do have some faith in them to score points soon...

 

[Hugo Koblet]

Seems like my fear about Kwiatkowski was right. Hugely disappointing after E3. Now it's gonna be really hard for him to even break even.

 

[Squire]

Now we're talking!

A fine Ardennes week puts me in a very good position, and in the coming races I'll have an opportunity to finally claw my way into the top 10. All my expensive picks are doing more or less what they should, and although I've missed out on a lot of the cheap guys who've been very profitable so far, the overall solidity of my team is very pleasing. Recently, a very encouraging trend has been that a lot of the big picks I didn't go for are not really performing.

If things go my way, I could enter the top 10 next week:

Tour de Romandie
LOPEZ MORENO Miguel Angel
VAN GARDEREN Tejay
VELITS Peter
JUNGELS Bob
KITTEL Marcel
VERVAEKE Louis
GERRANS Simon
HAIG Jack
TALANSKY Andrew

I'm looking for a good result from Van Garderen, and with some luck, I could have another couple of guys in the top 15. The field is very stacked though. Jungels to show some strong time trialing ahead of the Giro, but will probably not score a lot of points here. I want Haig to start picking up something more than thanks-for-finishing points soon. Not sure this is where I should expect it to happen, though.

Tour de Yorkshire
BARGUIL Warren
GOSS Matthew

Barguil with a great opportunity to score some good points, and make him a very promising pick, despite my initial doubts. As for Goss, I'm starting to worry that he won't ever score any more CQ points in his career.

Rund um den Finanzplatz
MARTIN Tony
GAVIRIA RENDON Fernando
CIOLEK Gerald
KÄMNA Lennard
MARTINEZ Yannick
POZZATO Filippo

This could be fantastic, or it could be nothing of note.

Seems like my fear about Kwiatkowski was right. Hugely disappointing after E3. Now it's gonna be really hard for him to even break even.

Kwiatkowski was one of my main worries before the game started, and so far I'm happy to see that he's not proving to be a potential game winner. I thought Sky would either make him an absolute machine, or squander him a bit, and currently it's looking more like the latter. I think he's gonna break even though, he still has lots of opportunities to score points after the Tour de France.

 

[Hugo Koblet]

Re:

Seems like my fear about Kwiatkowski was right. Hugely disappointing after E3. Now it's gonna be really hard for him to even break even.

Kwiatkowski was one of my main worries before the game started, and so far I'm happy to see that he's not proving to be a potential game winner. I thought Sky would either make him an absolute machine, or squander him a bit, and currently it's looking more like the latter. I think he's gonna break even though, he still has lots of opportunities to score points after the Tour de France.

The thing is, Kwiatkowski tends to score his points in the spring. Here's his points tally post LBL the last three years:

2013: 504
2014: 808
2015: 222

In 2013, 292 of those points were from the Tour which he's unlikely to come close to again this year and of course in 2014, 400 points came from the Worlds.

I don't know his program after the Tour, but hopefully Sky will give him a schedule which allows him to score some points.

 

[Squire]

Re: Re:

Seems like my fear about Kwiatkowski was right. Hugely disappointing after E3. Now it's gonna be really hard for him to even break even.

Kwiatkowski was one of my main worries before the game started, and so far I'm happy to see that he's not proving to be a potential game winner. I thought Sky would either make him an absolute machine, or squander him a bit, and currently it's looking more like the latter. I think he's gonna break even though, he still has lots of opportunities to score points after the Tour de France.

The thing is, Kwiatkowski tends to score his points in the spring. Here's his points tally post LBL the last three years:

2013: 504
2014: 808
2015: 222

In 2013, 292 of those points were from the Tour which he's unlikely to come close to again this year and of course in 2014, 400 points came from the Worlds.

I don't know his program after the Tour, but hopefully Sky will give him a schedule which allows him to score some points.

You are right. After I posted, I went to check on his autumn results, and it seems he never goes really well in the second half of the season, Worlds '14 being the notable exception.

But! There are just so many possible sources of points for a rider like him. He's likely to get small tricklings of points from races where he's working for Froome, they all add up, and then you have nationals, Olympics (he can perform in both RR and TT), autumn classics, maybe something like Tour of Britain, Worlds TTT. Sky seem to do a lot of Italian late season races, too. He might even start today, by winning the Romandie prologue.

He very unlikely to be a really bad pick. And besides, this year it's not like you had to choose between Kwiatkowski and another expensive rider who's actually performing. Having Kwiat doesn't mean you miss out on any of the other important semi-expensive guys, so he's not the lesser option of two popular choices, for example.

You should maybe worry more about Arredondo and Cort

 

[Hugo Koblet]

Re: Re:

Seems like my fear about Kwiatkowski was right. Hugely disappointing after E3. Now it's gonna be really hard for him to even break even.

Kwiatkowski was one of my main worries before the game started, and so far I'm happy to see that he's not proving to be a potential game winner. I thought Sky would either make him an absolute machine, or squander him a bit, and currently it's looking more like the latter. I think he's gonna break even though, he still has lots of opportunities to score points after the Tour de France.

The thing is, Kwiatkowski tends to score his points in the spring. Here's his points tally post LBL the last three years:

2013: 504
2014: 808
2015: 222

In 2013, 292 of those points were from the Tour which he's unlikely to come close to again this year and of course in 2014, 400 points came from the Worlds.

I don't know his program after the Tour, but hopefully Sky will give him a schedule which allows him to score some points.

You are right. After I posted, I went to check on his autumn results, and it seems he never goes really well in the second half of the season, Worlds '14 being the notable exception.

But! There are just so many possible sources of points for a rider like him. He's likely to get small tricklings of points from races where he's working for Froome, they all add up, and then you have nationals, Olympics (he can perform in both RR and TT), autumn classics, maybe something like Tour of Britain, Worlds TTT. Sky seem to do a lot of Italian late season races, too. He might even start today, by winning the Romandie prologue.

He very unlikely to be a really bad pick. And besides, this year it's not like you had to choose between Kwiatkowski and another expensive rider who's actually performing. Having Kwiat doesn't mean you miss out on any of the other important semi-expensive guys, so he's not the lesser option of two popular choices, for example.

You should maybe worry more about Arredondo and Cort

Arredondo and Cort are definitely my main worries at the moment alongside Meersman.

Arredondo has been absolutely woeful. I have no idea what's going on. Tour of Croatia could have been a nice opportunity for him to get going, but I guess not. Cort has actually been pretty strong in the Belgian classics, but he hasn't got a chance to ride for himself - or when he has, he has failed. Meersman is a weird case. He has the characteristics and skills to do well in the racing program he's given, but he failed miserably in Nokere Koerse before podiuming Handzame Classic. I still haven't lost faith completely, but I'm definitely not happy with him

 

[Squire]

Re: Re:

Arredondo and Cort are definitely my main worries at the moment alongside Meersman.

Arredondo has been absolutely woeful. I have no idea what's going on. Tour of Croatia could have been a nice opportunity for him to get going, but I guess not. Cort has actually been pretty strong in the Belgian classics, but he hasn't got a chance to ride for himself - or when he has, he has failed. Meersman is a weird case. He has the characteristics and skills to do well in the racing program he's given, but he failed miserably in Nokere Koerse before podiuming Handzame Classic. I still haven't lost faith completely, but I'm definitely not happy with him

Here is the reason why I didn't pick Arredondo. Sadly, it seems like he still hasn't solved his health problems.

 

[the asian]

Pleased to maintain my 17th position this week despite a poor showing by Nibbles.

Now sweating on the GIro....

 

[Jancouver]

Looking at my team, it's a bag of mix feelings.

Best performers so far:

Cance + 311
Gerrans + 300
Kittel + 280
Vakoc + 198
Vichot + 150

obviously, the first 3 are common picks so no real gain there.

Worst performers so far.

Dennis -905
Martin Tony -463
Bonifazio -314
Formolo -285
Moser -214
Meersman - 204

 

[del1962]

I was looking forward to Niemic picking up some points in Turkey this week, nvm

 

[LaFlorecita]

Ouch. My points this week had to come from Romandie, but it's not looking good. Arredondo DNF'ed, Rosa did a great TT but finished 7 minutes down today, and Tejay crashed and finished 20th. A top 10 is still possible, but of course I had hoped for more

 

[BigMac]

Will there be a Giro game?

 

[Ferminal]

Zakarin and free points for Pardilla should keep me top10.

 

[LaFlorecita]

Hmm, pretty bad week for me... Tejay, Bananito, Kittel, that's it I think

 

[skidmark]

Well, I'm off to work in the woods for a few months as is my custom; the very capable hands of Hugo Koblet will take over updates for May (starting with this next one), and I have people lined up for June and July as of now. I'll be checking in but not regularly - good luck all!

 

[Armchair Cyclist]

Re:

Will there be a Giro game?

There will indeed

 

[Gigs_98]

Horrible week for me. But I think that generally there weren't that many popular rider who scored well so I maybe I wont loose that much points wise. For example I'm really lucky Tejay didnt make as many points as he could

 

[Squire]

Re:

Possibly my worst CQ week ever. Amazingly, I'm unlikely to lose that many places with my abysmal haul of 163 points or so. However, this week I've lost out on several hundred points in DNFs and DNSs and injuries.

Tour de Romandie
LOPEZ MORENO Miguel Angel - DNF
VAN GARDEREN Tejay - 10th
VELITS Peter - 83rd
JUNGELS Bob - DNF
KITTEL Marcel - DNF
VERVAEKE Louis - DNF
GERRANS Simon - DNF
HAIG Jack - 39th
TALANSKY Andrew - 105th

Look at that DNF fest. TJVG way below expectations. An ambitious Vervaeke in great shape crashing out. I'm amazed Talansky even finished the race and scored his first points.

Tour de Yorkshire
BARGUIL Warren - DNS
GOSS Matthew - DNS

The way things turned out in the race, Barguil might have missed out on the win due to illness. Goss not even starting his "big season goal" of course, but that has stopped annoying me.

Rund um den Finanzplatz
MARTIN Tony - 56th
GAVIRIA RENDON Fernando - DNS
CIOLEK Gerald - DNS
KÄMNA Lennard - DNF
MARTINEZ Yannick - DNF
POZZATO Filippo - 13th

This could be fantastic, or it could be nothing of note.

In keeping with the rest of my week, it was of course the latter. Ciolek continuing to have his spring season ruined by illness, and Gaviria, with his injury, missing out on the potential to be a 1000-pointer by the end of the year, in my opinion. Those May races could've been a points bonanza.

In short, the lack of results by the riders who actually raced this week wasn't the worst, the problem is the potentially several hundreds of points that has gone out the window through crashes and illness. There's still hope though, at least I didn't have Simon Yates (was a close call between including him or Kreuziger).

 

[HelgeBlendet]

If you don't count Kittel and Betancur, I scored 32 points in Romandie (Kudus, Bohli), 5 in Frankfurt (Nerz), 0 in Turkey, and 0 in Yorkshire. I guess I'll drop down quite a bit this week...

 

[Brullnux]

I think this week was actually pretty good for me. In Turkey I had Roson and Ockoleon getting good results; Kudus and Frank in Romandie (and Kittel); Yates in Yorkshire and Pardilla in Asturias.

 

[GP Blanco]

Giro d'Italia
PERAUD Jean Christophe
DE MARCHI Alessandro
FORMOLO Davide
KUDUS GHEBREMEDHIN Merhawi
KITTEL Marcel
DEMARE Arnaud
BETANCUR GOMEZ Carlos Alberto
MEZGEC Luka

Hopefully Peraud will make the top-10. He himself is aiming for a top-5 which is quite ambitious looking at his results his year. Formolo and Kudus to finish around the 20th place in the GC. De Marchi for his usual stage hunting. Betancur is really a joker. Kittel and Démare for the sprints. Mezgec to lead out Ewan and hopefully Ewan will drop out after the first mountain stages so Mezgec can sprint in the last stage.