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The 2019 CQ Ranking Manager Thread

Page 8 - Get up to date with the latest news, scores & standings from the Cycling News Community.
Re: Re:

skidmark said:
Salvarani said:
Below is my team and some thoughts.


POWER Robert 363 - 6th at SB and won two other one-day races. Changed team from Mitchelton-Scott to Sunweb for 2019. Only 23 years old. He is only on 5 teams, so really hope he gets it going at Sunweb :D

KANTER Max 200 - Another young rider with a good sprint.

FRANKINY Kilian 138 - From BMC to Groupama this year. Young climber with potential. My only unique pick :eek:

VERVAEKE Louis 66 - Still only 25. A lot of races he left and had to DNF or DNS right in the end of them, last year. Catalunya was his biggest achievement last season. I think he can get some better results this year. Will probably be riding in a supporting role most of the times though.

First, that is cool that you got Frankiny with a unique pick. I didn't consider him seriously this year, but looking at his situation, sometimes a change of team and calendar can unlock things for a developing rider, so definitely worth a shot. For the Sunweb riders - I strongly considered picking alot of them, they have a bunch of young talent like Storer, Hamilton, Hindley, etc... but therein lies the problem. They've got their GC guys in Dumoulin, Oomen, Kelderman, and they've got their classics guys in Matthews, Andersen... which of the remaining opportunities go to whom? It's hard to divine into who will get chances and who will be used for the leaders. Power might fit into an interesting niche, as he showed himself a good GC rider in his youth but has really done well as a CQ pick in punchy mid-tier one-day races. So he could be a good pick. Just hard to say with that team, I find.

Yeah, I see what your saying but sooner or later they gone get it right with that also.

I think both Kanter and Power will get their chances. Kanter could be a Jakobsen/Hodeg type of situation. Definitely has potential.

Power showed enough in punchy mid-tier one-day races that I think he can and will continue to do that. He has also managed to actually win them, in comparison to other riders with just potential.

Vervaeke is whatever. I had some more points, so I just skimmed through that point-range and picked him. He had not completed a few races last year. So just completing them should mean more points. Hopefully a result on a stage or one-day race can happen. You never know...
 
Re: Re:

tobydawq said:
Koronin said:
tobydawq said:
Koronin said:
As I have a fairly unique team I'll list my most popular riders that I choose.

Nibali - 87 - With his injury he lost the Tour and didn't have much of a Vuelta. There is potential for him to get reach just over 1,000 points. Felt I had to have him on my team.

Alberto Bettiol - 92 - Change of teams to EF Education First from BMC should improve his points.

Remco Evenepoel - 89 - He's my zero pointer so hoping for the best.

Ben Swift - 54 - at 72 points worth the gamble.

Mikel Landa - 24 - There is potential here. His first year with a team is typically worse than his second plus his second half of the season (even with a top 10 GC at the Tour) was destroyed by injuries.

Everyone else on my team is on 10 teams or less. My two riders on only 10 teams are:
Sepp Kuss - hoping his second year with Jumbo will bring more points.
Rafa Valls - Basically he fits on my team with the budget.

Cristian Munoz - 9 teams - at 13 points and first year World Tour he has potential and worked well for my budget.


As such the majority of my team is relatively low picked riders with 8 unique picks. All my sprinters are low picks as the higher picked sprinters although good bargains I just don't trust. I have more confidence in Coquard and Lobato to at least break even.

How this well end up playing out, who knows, but I suspect as long as Valverde has his typically consistent season I'll finish mid pack again.

But why don't go for more? You will cheer for Valverde anyway and you know that he takes up more than two thirds of your budget and is very unlikely to give a profit of more than 10 percent if any at all so taking him effectively disqualifies you from a high finishing position.


True I'll cheer for him anyway. I'm going for his consistency and that with the hope of some of these other kids should put my team somewhere in the middle by the end.

Yes, but that was not what I was asking.

But nevermind.

Do I want more, yes, however, I'm still trying to figure out the best strategy to get there. So I'd prefer having his consistency for now.
 
Some riders on my team, that less than 10 other teams picked. I guess how these goes will decide a lot! Good/bad pick...

POWER Robert
MÄDER Gino
TOUZE Damien
ANTUNES Amaro Manuel Reposo
VLASOV Alexander
FRANKINY Kilian
RIABUSHENKO Aliaksandr
CONCI Nicola
GIBBONS Ryan
VERVAEKE Louis
ALMEIDA Joao Pedro Gonçalves
MUÑOZ LANCHEROS Cristian Camilo
 
Squire said:
Your team looks cool. I'm surprised you didn't go with Pogi. ;) I was very close to making Jhojan Garcia a non-unique pick for you. But in the end I decided to go for Pronskiy, who I then switched for Valls in a PM to skidmark 5 minutes before the deadline.

My heart is bleeding, but Pogi was too expensive.

I was that close to change my team at the last second as well, but then didn't. I would have liked to include Osorio (whom you picked), but couldn't find a good way to do it.
 
I haven't managed to find time for a writeup of my full team, but I'd like to make a post giving my thoughts and asking for others thoughts on the rider I'm most intrigued by on my team, which would be

VAN DER POEL Mathieu (539 points, 20 teams)

He ended up being the sort of 'watershed' pick on my team... the way I pick is that I spend lots of time combing through a huge longlist and going over each rider in more depth until I convince myself into or out of them. I had 23 riders for sure, and a big list of possible other riders. Then, looking more and more into MVDP (who wasn't in the 23), i just decided to go for him, had to take Trentin out of my team, and the last ten riders fell into place based on remaining budget and who I was considering. But aside from watching him continually dominate the CX races this year, here is some of my thinking:

- he's a generational talent and is never not in form (just kind of showed up to the Netherlands nationals in July and won; just kind of showed up to the Euros a month later and got 2nd, etc)
- he got 539 points in THIRTEEN DAYS of racing last year
- he's old enough that he doesn't really need to adjust to do well in the top races, as the nats, Euros show
- he's good in every race that doesn't have a mountain in it
- here is a partial list of riders who have finished second to him in sprints in the past two years: Enger, Van Poppel, Bouhanni, Gilbert

So, he's got the chops to be a force on the road; I feel like Amstel is the perfect race for him, and his spring calendar is smart. If we were going to do the transitive property comparison, if Van Aert did as well as he did last year and I see him as a top 20 CQ talent (1000-1500 points), I see MVDP as a top 3-5 talent (2000+). But therein lies the rub. He isn't doing a full season, and it's not clear what he's doing beyond the spring. Because he does well in virtually every race, it's hard to find space for him to improve. Because it's one rider concentrated on such a small calendar, one crash could wipe it all away. So it's a risk. But it's not crazy to think about him on the podium of Flanders and AGR either.

So, what to expect? Ultimately I thought he has a range of like 300-800 in the spring races on his calendar, I really don't know what to expect on that front. But then throw in some random participations later in the season, races which he seems to win or compete in regardless, and even if he's short in the spring he'll make up for it. Corendon being PCT means they'll get invites to better than 1.1 races - what if he wins the nationals again and goes to the BinkBanck Tour in the summer? What if he decides he feels like trying out the Worlds after the spring goes well? I just feel like the sky is the limit with the guy.

How about you guys, did you consider him? Choose him? Not choose him? I'm curious, because this was definitely the rider I thought longest and hardest about.
 
I wanted to choose MVDP but didn't see enough room for improvement in the end.
Major pro: as you say, he is pretty much always in shape and can handle a wide variety of races
Major con: no clue what races he'll do beyond RvV and AGR.
I looked at what he scored this year and concluded that he'd have to repeat those performances and podium both RVV and AGR to be worth it for me, and I didn't want to take that risk.
 
I though about Van der Poel very briefly, but he's got way too many ifs for me. Another thing, which I don't know if you've considered, is that he's always had a big break after the CX season. When he starts the classics season this year, he will have had a continous 'season' since the end of May last year, with just a small break in September. How fresh will he be?

But as you say, what he did in those 13 race days last year is amazing. Van der Hoorn is a somewhat similar story. I was closer to picking him than VDP actually.
 
I picked Van Aert in place of Van der Poel for the following reasons:
- 1 year more experienced in the classics
- better team
- unfolding of cyclocross season (I'm an avid fan of the sport) and Van der Poel's complete dominance.
I think Mathieu could pay a price for it. Koppenbergcross in particular showed his weaknesses on one of the hardest cyclocross parcours.
Van Aert otoh usually peaks for the Cyclocross Worlds Championships and,maybe,will have more in the tank for the spring classics.
 
Re:

Squire said:
I though about Van der Poel very briefly, but he's got way too many ifs for me. Another thing, which I don't know if you've considered, is that he's always had a big break after the CX season. When he starts the classics season this year, he will have had a continous 'season' since the end of May last year, with just a small break in September. How fresh will he be?
Van Aert did pretty well last year with a similar race program.
 
I picked both Wout and VdP, skidmark.
I feel exactly the same way as you do regarding VdP. He's a risky pick, but as I said in a previous post I went for a different strategy this year and picked some expensive high ceiling and low floor riders.
Taco was on my shortlist as well, but I could not afford him.

More thoughts on my team in the next few days.
 
BERNAL GOMEZ Egan Arley
Points 1130 Pop 26
I think how Egan and my next pick perform may define my season

QUINTANA ROJAS Nairo Alexander
Points 1118 Pop 8
Suprised to see so few picks

PORTE Richie
Points 868 pop 25
Should pick up enough points to justify his selection.

NIBALI Vincenzo
Points 693 pop 87
Should be OK, proved he has overcome injury in Lombardia

GAVIRIA RENDON Fernando
Points 602 pop 82
Still has bags of potential

ZAKARIN Ilnur
Points 473 pop 69
If he can repeat 2017 then should be OK

ARU Fabio
Points 400 pop 95
Suprised by his popularity, still think a solid pick, though could be a flop.

GAUDU David
Points 299 pop 57
Expecting him to push on

KITTEL Marcel
Points 296 picks 98
Most popular of all, think even a mediocre season he will score better

CHAVES RUBIO Jhoan Esteban
Points 263 pop 89
The cost persuaded me, not entirely convinced though

FELLINE Fabio
Points 257 pop 63
Can pick up points all over the place

MARTIN Tony
Points 248 pop 22
Given the right race program should be a good pick

MEINTJES Louis
Points 141 picks 79
Should pick up points by stage race placings

CAVENDISH Mark
Points 125 picks 79
Cav I still beleive

MCLAY Daniel
Points 88 picks 18
Think he will score enough to justify

SWIFT Ben
Points 72 picks 53
Back at Sky where he will be happy

ROWE Luke
Points 70 picks 28
A good classic season and he justifies himself

BETTIOL Alberto
Points 50 picks 92
At that price?

HOWES Alex
Points 44 picks 8
Needs a good American season

VALLS FERRI Rafael
Points 43 picks 10
Hopefully he can have better season, a good performance on Willunga hill might help

PARET-PEINTRE Aurélien
Points 47 picks 10
HÄNNINEN Jaakko
Points 48 picks 9
Two exciting AG2R neo pros

KÄMNA Lennard
Points 37 picks 38
Hopefully he can fulfil his potential

BOOM Lars
Points 37 picks 66
Step down a level, will think he will consitently score in begium races

HUFFMAN Evan
Points 30 pop 7
Hopefully should do well in american races after poor season

MUÑOZ LANCHEROS Cristian Camilo
Points 13 picks 9
UAE Neo Pro - we will see how he does

SCOTSON Callum
Points 7 Picks 11
Another Neo much the same

KÖNIG Leopold
points 0 picks 22
DE CLERCQ Bart
Points 0 Picks 3

last two pick of zero pointers - not sure how either will do

VAKOC Petr
points 0 Picks 73

Making the right noises after accident, I picked him last year.

Three zero point juniors

MAYRHOFER Marius
Picks 4
VACEK Karel
Picks 14
EVENEPOEL Remco
Picks 86

One needs to just live up to a tenth of his hype, the other was the second best junior of the year and the other showed something in Junior Worlds RR finishing second.
 
Appreciate the thoughts on VdP, keep 'em coming if you have them. Just to reflect on a few things said.

Yeah I did think about his continuous season, and I do think that is the biggest risk. Like, what if he underperforms in the classics and then realizes he's taken on too much and doesn't do any more road in 2019 so he can retool for 2020 Olympics. That's the worst case scenario. But I guess, given that I think of him almost as a Sagan level talent, he will still get some results (like, even in 2015 when Sagan wasn't quite right in the classics and bonked in Strade Bianche and E3, he still got 4th in Flanders and MSR). It is a bit of hoping for the best - on one hand, he's highly motivated since it's his first real classics season, on the other hand, it's a bit of unknown how he can do. Definitely more risk than I usually put in such an expensive rider, with a razor thin margin for upside given the lack of road race days.

I do think it's a bit different than WvA last year, because he sucked for the first half of the cross season - not like this year when he's 2nd place, 30 seconds behind VdP, but finishing in the mid-low top 10 in some important races. So he did race into form at the Worlds and then held that form through the classics season. VdP is in top shape now... maybe? I mean, what if he isn't and this is just his base level? I didn't take his stumble at the CX Worlds last year as him being burnt out so much as him having an off day. So I guess I'm banking on him having a higher base level than WvA, which I think is a sound assumption, and then having the level on top of that to perform well in the classics, which is the risk.

In terms of lots of points in few race days, yes there's young Taco and he was tempting (partially because he's got the best name in the peloton), but I guess I shied away because there's no guarantee you can extrapolate those results to a full season - going to a PT team, he might have a similarly good run of a dozen race days that get him similar points, but then he might burn 21 race days on a GT getting nothing. It's the opposite of the VdP conundrum, where you know he's good but don't know if he'll have enough race days to make it worth it. Either way, it might have been smarter to pick WvA given that he's not much more expensive and he's now with a WT road team. But we shall see.
 
This is my third straight year picking Van der Poel and during that time I watched him go from 38 points to 340 to 539 to wherever he’ll land this year. Every year I try to talk myself out of picking him by arguing he won’t race enough but the end I always get back to this: he’s amazing. I get that’s not high-level analysis but it’s true. You get a guy that put up peak Valverde/Sagan efficiency last year, at an age where he’s still getting better, with better support and a better program than last year with zero injury concern. What’s not to like besides arguably the small sample size on the road (you could argue that the results he gets on the road while racing there so infrequently make his achievements more impressive though)? I could understand that the price tag is a bit high for some but getting that kind of talent has a price and there are a few riders that are more expensive and more popular without nearly the same upside.
 
PORTE Richie
NIBALI Vincenzo
GAVIRIA RENDON Fernando
VAN DER POEL Mathieu
KÜNG Stefan
ARU Fabio
VAN DER HOORN Taco
LAMBRECHT Bjorg
GAUDU David
KITTEL Marcel
CHAVES RUBIO Jhoan Esteban
O'CONNOR Ben
PLANCKAERT Baptiste
BAUHAUS Phil
PADUN Mark
THEUNS Edward
LAMMERTINK Maurits
MOSER Moreno
NAVARDAUSKAS Ramunas
CAVENDISH Mark
VLIEGEN Loïc
HINDLEY Jai
THOMAS Benjamin
RODRIGUEZ GARAICOECHEA Oscar
HONORE Mikkel Frølich
ATAPUMA HURTADO Jhon Darwin
BETTIOL Alberto
HÄNNINEN Jaakko
ARENSMAN Thymen
BOOM Lars
CARDONA TABARES Julian
INTXAUSTI ELORRIAGA Beñat
VAKOC Petr

Will post a few pearls of wisdom about mine and other teams in the next few days.

But first, am amazed, and somewhat relieved, that only 5 teams have chosen Moscon. I had him last year and it was mostly a dispiriting experience until his comeback where he added over 750 points in just over 5 weeks. If he can improve his classics campaign (not difficult) and have a full season, I think he's one of the few riders who can gain 1000 points this season

Definitely
Moscon
Porte
Chavez

Mabye
Aru
Nibali

Champagne Supernova season
Froome
Landa
Quintana

Do you agree?
 
Re:

jon ezeitza said:
I have not seen any message that doubts Beñat Intxausti's score. I have been counted 0 points, but on the CQ website he puts 12, obtained in the Hammer Stavanger series from Norway.
Jon, I can't look at the spreadsheet right now but possibly you made a mistake in his name. You should contact skidmark via PM and he'll solve it.
 
Re: Re:

LaFlorecita said:
jon ezeitza said:
I have not seen any message that doubts Beñat Intxausti's score. I have been counted 0 points, but on the CQ website he puts 12, obtained in the Hammer Stavanger series from Norway.
Jon, I can't look at the spreadsheet right now but possibly you made a mistake in his name. You should contact skidmark via PM and he'll solve it.

Flo is right, you forgot Elorriaga. But skidmark has been made aware earlier today.
 
Hmmm
I really don't understand why Porte who turns 34 this year is a definetly, when compared to his best season he has 618 points or 71% benefit to gain from this season. Quintana on the other hand is five years younger and compared to his best season has 1274 points or 113% benefit to gain. So I would say that it is LRP that needs a Champagne Supernova season (or a season without crashing) to be a good pick :D Nairo is just too expensive and has been too disappointing to be trusted.
 
My team is very young and full of future leaders. These are those of the U23 category:

BERNAL Egan 22 years old
SOSA Ivan Ramiro 22
LAMBRECHT Bjorg 22
NARVAEZ Jhonatan 22
MADER Gino 22
EENKHOORN Pascal 22
KANTER Max 22
SIVAKOV Pavel 22
DEWULF Stan 22
PHILIPSEN Jasper 21
HIRSCHI Marc 21
STANNARD Robert 21
LEKNESSUND Andreas 20
ARENSMAN Thymen 20
EVENEPOEL Remco 19
MAYRHOFER Marius 19
WAERENSKJOLD Soren 19
VAN WILDER Ilan 19
AASHEIM Ludvig 19
BALMER Alexandre 19
VACEK Karel 19
GHIRMAY Biniyam 19

These are 23-25 years old.

JAKOBSEN Fabio 23
HODEG Alvaro 23
HALVORSEN Kristoffer 23
BENNETT Sean 23
DE PLUS Laurens 24
SWIFT Connor 24
LAWLESS Christopher 24
SCHACHMANN Maximilian 25

And these are the ones that remain:

VAKOC Petr 27
CHAVES Jhoan Esteban 29
INTXAUSTI Beñat 33
 
Re: Re:

tobydawq said:
LaFlorecita said:
jon ezeitza said:
I have not seen any message that doubts Beñat Intxausti's score. I have been counted 0 points, but on the CQ website he puts 12, obtained in the Hammer Stavanger series from Norway.
Jon, I can't look at the spreadsheet right now but possibly you made a mistake in his name. You should contact skidmark via PM and he'll solve it.

Flo is right, you forgot Elorriaga. But skidmark has been made aware earlier today.
Sorry. I did not know that without writing the second surname there were 0 points. The truth is that very few cyclists appear on the CQ website with their second surname :surprised: .
 
Re: Re:

jon ezeitza said:
tobydawq said:
LaFlorecita said:
jon ezeitza said:
I have not seen any message that doubts Beñat Intxausti's score. I have been counted 0 points, but on the CQ website he puts 12, obtained in the Hammer Stavanger series from Norway.
Jon, I can't look at the spreadsheet right now but possibly you made a mistake in his name. You should contact skidmark via PM and he'll solve it.

Flo is right, you forgot Elorriaga. But skidmark has been made aware earlier today.
Sorry. I did not know that without writing the second surname there were 0 points. The truth is that very few cyclists appear on the CQ website with their second surname :surprised: .

Actually, the CQ website is one of the few who still has the second surnames of all Spanish speaking riders...

The problem is that if it's not written exactly like on CQ, the Excel spreadsheet will not recognize the name, and that's why it says that he had 0 points.
 

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