The 2019 CQ Ranking Manager Thread

[Popchu]

Re:

Lutsenko is an irrational pick, I should've picked MVDP. Still, I expect a lot from Lutsenko but he's not the best pick for this kind of game.

At the start of this game, I said the above regarding Lutsenko / Van der Poel. While I was happy with Lutsenko, Van der Poel probably was the better choice. The best choice, however, was to have them both in my team. :lol:

 

[fauniera]

Lambrecht looks like a very good pick. Skidmark will be happy.

Picking Mathieu obviously was one of my best decisions this year.

 

[tobydawq]

I have a good feeling about this week. Object is still out of reach but otherwise, I think I could go up to second place in the standings.

I look forward to the update.

 

[Mayomaniac]

Lambrecht looks like a very good pick. Skidmark will be happy.

Picking Mathieu obviously was one of my best decisions this year.

Yes, i'm also happy with picking Lambrecht, my best pick has to be Bettiol.
I'm still waiting for some of the gc riders to perform durning May, Nibali, Zakarin and Landa at the Giro and Porte in Cali.
The Aru thing is a bit of a setback, I regret not picking Kudus, who was on my list.
Overall i expected more from the young Italians, it looks like i picked the wrong ones (Ciccone, Conci
, Carboni and Fabbro).

 

[skidmark]

Before even addressing the CQ week - that MvdP stuff at AGR was... :surprised: I've never seen anything like it in a race. After coming back from a crash at a crucial time in Flanders, and then easily outsprinting Alaphilippe and Matthews (boxed in but still) in Brabantse Pijl, my mind was pretty blown. But Amstel was nuts, most unbelievable finish to a race of that magnitude that I can remember.

Anyway, MvdP is 'done' his road season, and is a pretty good pick if he doesn't pick up another point. Almost double on a 500ish rider is totally good. But after what I've seen in this last month, he could decide on a whim to ride the Dutch Nationals, Europeans, and Worlds, and legit win them all. I hope I get to see him race again this year just for the sheer fun of it, but definitely for CQ purposes too.

fauniera is right, I'm definitely pleased with Lambrecht this week, 5th and 6th in the two races. And from that finish in Pais Vasco, I could see him on the podium in Fleche Wallone. Not that I'm expecting it, but even to think it's a realistic possibility is exciting. Two weeks ago, I wasn't sure when I'd get a point out of him. Last week, I had some hopes for FW but not much else. Now he's completed a long hilly race in the top tier. That's exciting.

Apart from that, Cosnefroy won a race, B. Planckaert started picking up points now that the elite races are over and he can pick up placings in random 1.1 races, and Evenepoel lives up to his potential in Turkey. Apart from Evenepoel, all those other guys are relatively rareish picks so I'm very happy about the week. About the only thing that could've gone better is if Ben O'Connor hadn't fizzled out in Turkey, I seriously thought he could top 5. Now that vdP's season is effectively done, I'll savor this next update because I don't expect to have another one like it for some time (until the worlds - please consider it Mathieu!)

 

[skidmark]

Update #15: Out of a skid - MvP of Classics Helps Teams Recover From Early Season Mediocrity

With the cobbled classics behind us, this week turned to the hilly classics, while low-key WT racing went down in Turkey, and the continuing drip-drip of 1.1 races here and there in the background. Clearly, with an astonishing win in AGR on top of a merely extremely impressive one in Brabantse Pijl, the 20 teams with Mathieu van der Poel were going to crowd the leaderboard this week. How did they all fare?

This Week's Top Scorers

Rank Team Points this week
1 skidmark 842
2 ChrisDK 833
3 tobydawq 806
4 Jakob747 793
5 EvansIsTheBest 787

Three teams scored over 800 points this week, which is led by team skidmark (it's been awhile since I've been on top of a leaderboard, but I will resume my practice of referring to my team in the third person) ekes out the weekly win with 842 points. Aside from the massive 360 from van der Poel (to put in context, only 39 teams had over 360 total this week, or 20 with vdP and 19 without), Lambrecht came alive with 130 points over two races, the mostly ubiquitous Evenepoel got 109, Cosnefroy woke up to win a 1.1 race and get 85 on the week, and a smattering of other points. ChrisDK comes close in second with (of course) both 'Poel's (Remco and Mathieu), but a different tack with 173 points from unique pick Sam Bennett, who despite his price tag is looking like he could be a world beater this year. tobydawq manages third with the above mentioned duo, 85 from Cosnefroy, and 102 points from Caleb Ewan.

This Week's High Movers

Rank Team Up/down
1 ChrisDK (+38)
2 postmanhat (+35)
3 Sestriere (+27)
4 ingsve (+25)
5 flashke (+24)

A bit of a different look on this ranking - ChrisDK is the only holdover from the first list, winning this one with a 38 place leap. postmanhat goes up 35 as well, thanks largely to vdP and Lambrecht (and would have been second in weekly points if their team wasn't the rare one without Evenepoel), while Sestriere nabs 3rd without van der Poel, but with an impressive combination including Evenepoel, Cosnefroy, Lambrecht, Merhawi Kudus (4 teams, 139 points this week and into profit for the year), and the continuing impressiveness of Max Schachmann.

Green Jersey Competition

Rank Team Total
1 Googolplex 144
2 Popchu 118
3 armchairclimber 115
4 Nicosix 105
5 TheArt 104

No changes or points in the top 5 here; skidmark's 45 points for the win puts their team at #6 overall with 100 points, and tobydawq's 30 points get their team into 9th overall. That's the only action in the top 10.

Top 10 Overall

Rank Up/down Team Points
1 (-) Object 4768
2 (+8) tobydawq 4704
3 (+4) Tigerion 4655
4 (+5) Kryvo 4625
5 (+1) fauniera 4551
6 (-1) Joelsim 4542
7 (+6) Lortnoc 4483
8 (-6) Googolplex 4450
9 (+15) SafeBet 4420
10 (+20) skidmark 4419

To see how this competition changes over the course of the season, I went back to update 10 and looked at all of the current top 10 - none of them were in the top 25 (the current top 3 were 28, 32, and 37 respectively) and 4 of them were in the bottom half of the table (Kryvo, Lortnoc, SafeBet and skidmark were 69, 70, 83 and 104 respectively). Five updates later and the table is looking a lot different. It's true that it's helpful to have a good start to this game to set a platform from which to launch, but never forget that it's a season-long game and things change all the time. This week, Object holds on to #1, but tobydawq's great week gets their team to within striking distance at #2, and Tigerion leaps into the last podium spot. This week sees Lortnoc, SafeBet and skidmark jump into the top 10, while TheArt, Popchu, Nicosix and Carlo Algatrensig (remember we had 11 in the top 10 last week due to a tie so we lose 4 and gain 3 this week) fall out.

This week sees some key pre-Giro jockeying at the Tour of the Alps, while the other Ardennes classics take place, culminating in La Grande Doyenne, marking the end of the spring monument season.

Spreadsheet at dropbox

 

[tobydawq]

Re:

I have a good feeling about this week. Object is still out of reach but otherwise, I think I could go up to second place in the standings.

I look forward to the update.

That was a pretty accurate prediction!

I don't know about next week, though. Hopefully, Nibali can win Tour of the Alps, and if he rides within his own watts, Óscar Rodríguez should obviously maul the opposition in Flèche Wallonne but otherwise, my team is largely absent. Maybe Bakelants can get points in Flèche or Liège? But I'm not really holding my breath (also because I would die if I did that until Sunday).

 

[shalgo]

I slipped only one place in the standings, which is much better than I expected. Caleb Ewan basically salvaged my week, along with minor point hauls from my rare picks Marko Kump, Elie Gesbert, and Benjamin Thomas. (Evenepoel and Bettiol are such common picks that they almost don't count.)

Longer-term, however, my bigger problem is that two of my more expensive picks--Hodeg and van der Hoorn--are essentially failed picks at this point. Hodeg doesn't even seem to be getting sprinting opportunities anymore, as he is being entered in the same races with Jakobsen. Van der Hoorn was a pure domestique, and not even a very good one, throughout the classics season. Disappointing after he looked so good last year from August-October.

 

[Koronin]

Thanks for the update.

How the heck my team is not at the bottom of the standings I have no idea.

 

[Mayomaniac]

Re:

I slipped only one place in the standings, which is much better than I expected. Caleb Ewan basically salvaged my week, along with minor point hauls from my rare picks Marko Kump, Elie Gesbert, and Benjamin Thomas. (Evenepoel and Bettiol are such common picks that they almost don't count.)

Longer-term, however, my bigger problem is that two of my more expensive picks--Hodeg and van der Hoorn--are essentially failed picks at this point. Hodeg doesn't even seem to be getting sprinting opportunities anymore, as he is being entered in the same races with Jakobsen. Van der Hoorn was a pure domestique, and not even a very good one, throughout the classics season. Disappointing after he looked so good last year from August-October.

Yes, I also picked Hodeg, I assumed that no Gaviria would mean that he'd get more opportunities, not less.
A big regret is not picking Vendrame, who was on my radar and just missed out.

 

[SafeBet]

Went from 112th to 9th in just over one month. That was a good ride, which will probably come to and end soon, with both WvA and MvdP almost done with their road season. Mathieu was a superstar but Wout was also a fun pick, especially his gutsy ride in PR. I don't regret picking him over Trentin, although the italian will easily score more points.

 

[fauniera]

Yeah, Trentin is a pain in the ass, he is scoring so consistently and will likely continue to do so. The Worlds course also suits him fine.

Wout can score good points at the Binck Bank Tour and in Hamburg, and maybe at the Belgian Championships (don't know the parcours).

 

[LaFlorecita]

Thanks for the update, skids. Sad to find out I dropped 17 places to 35th after my steady climb in previous weeks but it was inevitable In Tour of the Alps, Cattaneo finished 3rd today and is 3rd on GC, but I'll have to watch highlights later this evening to find out how he got there. It would be cool if he could get a good result here.

 

[Jakob747]

I'm currently 12th in the overall standings despite my most expensive pick Michael Valgren being abysmal, and not doing anything at all this year. What could not have been?

In Tour of the Alpes, I have two climbing talents in action (Florez and Carboni), who both were in the lead group on stage-1 and did reasonably again today on stage-2.

I have been especially keen on Florez in the past (In the U23 and junior ranks in Colombia at least), but his breakthrough on European soil is yet to come.

Hernan Dario Casas who was in charge of training and preparing the athletes on Boyacá Raza de Campeones back in 2016 previously stated Florez physically is not far behind some of the best Colombians- he did a test of 6,1w/Kg back in 016 and according to Casas could ride in the lower echelon of a top-10 in a GT in the future if all pans out.

I hope he gets to ride the Giro - on ProCyclingStats he isn't listed to ride, J. Cardona is the only Colombian named, yet I imagine there are still possibilities for some changes this far out.

Jonathan Caicedo has been in Ecuador preparing for Tour of Romandie. He won a stage (the TT) and the overall GC of Clásica Ciudad de Tulcán (Carapaz was 3rd). The TT was 18km and Caicedo was 24 seconds faster than Carapaz.

I hope Caicedo ride the Giro as well. He was a wild-card selection and so far there hasn't been much to celebrate, so hoping for some sort of miracle in May.

 

[Tonton]

Right at #100 after what I knew would be a bad week. My learning of the game is the hard way, but the harder part is almost over...Some of you guys/gals amaze me...props for your lineups that deliver 500, 600, and more a week. It doesn't happen by accident, or at least it won't over a full season. Chapeau to the top-20.

Tibo-less Alps, build up to GTs, still two big one-day races coming up, the first chapter of our '19 season is coming to a close. Some great racing, MVDP and Alaf on top, as well as the Yates that you first thought was the best Yates, then wasn't, and now is. Is he?

Valverde and Nibali have to deliver this week.

BTW, what are Sagan and GVA doing? Mediocre start, really underwhelming.

 

[Tigerion]

Not sure it is my highest ever placing but certainly the highest after the 1st month of competition
A huge chunk of the advantage is coming from MVP so not sure how long I'll be able to hold the position.
Heading much more into stage racing season and my GC riders are not looking great. But I'll enjoy the podium while I'm there

 

[tobydawq]

With more than a 1000 points, Fuglsang is almost in positive territory (he is just missing 30 points) already before Liège.

Unfortunately, nobody has him...

Pretty sensational that he could have been such a fantastic pick.

 

[armchairclimber]

No-one, especially not Fuglsang himself, could have seen this sort of form coming.
With Schachmann and Lambrecht, today was ok for me ... I just need a good show in LBL to get back into the upper reaches of the table. Unfortunately, I think my squad is lacking in the GT GC department, unless Schachmann goes nuts.

 

[Koronin]

Right at #100 after what I knew would be a bad week. My learning of the game is the hard way, but the harder part is almost over...Some of you guys/gals amaze me...props for your lineups that deliver 500, 600, and more a week. It doesn't happen by accident, or at least it won't over a full season. Chapeau to the top-20.

Tibo-less Alps, build up to GTs, still two big one-day races coming up, the first chapter of our '19 season is coming to a close. Some great racing, MVDP and Alaf on top, as well as the Yates that you first thought was the best Yates, then wasn't, and now is. Is he?

Valverde and Nibali have to deliver this week.

BTW, what are Sagan and GVA doing? Mediocre start, really underwhelming.

That isn't happening for Valverde and at this point I'm writing off the entire season. Now how much longer before my team is dead last. I'm having a hard time believing anyone could have possibly found a way to come up with a worse team and I picked.

 

[bminchow]

I'm steadily dropping down the standings. Enough of this. I'm ready to see what happens in the Giro, with 10 riders starting, Gavaria for some wins (? Please), and a Bernal victory. I know, still weeks away but my spring team is a joke behind Bettiol and Trentin.I also need Nibali to step up and cover for my really bad Aru pick. Maybe in LBL?

 

[Mayomaniac]

I can understand why nobody picked Fuglsang.
He had his highest points score ever last year and given his age it's totally reasonable to think that you shouldn't gamble on him doing well.
Nibali and Lamprecht are doing good this week, now I just need a solid final stage from Carboni. May will be a key month for me, Padun having a knee injury an Aru's health problems have been bad news for me.

 

[tobydawq]

Re:

I can understand why nobody picked Fuglsang.
He had his highest points score ever last year and given his age it's totally reasonable to think that you shouldn't gamble on him doing well.
Nibali and Lamprecht are doing good this week, now I just need a solid final stage from Carboni. May will be a key month for me, Padun having a knee injury an Aru's health problems have been bad news for me.

Of course, I didn't even consider him for a second, either. It just shows how much out of nowhere this spring has been. He can potentially break into top 5 in the year-long ranking on Sunday.

 

[LaFlorecita]

Nice performance by my team in Tour of the Alps, with Nibali and Cattaneo. Especially Cattaneo's 4th place is a relief, he looked a little underwhelming at the start of the year but with almost a 100 points from this race he'll be 3/4ths of his 2018 score, and he's looking strong for the Giro. Good news for ThePirate81 and me

 

[tobydawq]

So annoying that Quintero rode that foolishly. Still, he seems like an improbably good pick.

 

[DJ Sprtsch]

My man Carboni cracked in spectacular fashion today - 15+ minutes behind, dropping from 8thto 22nd in the GC. Sigh.
Still, very happy I have Nibali.