The 2025 CQ Ranking Manager Thread

[Devil's Elbow]

A mixed bag this week in the end, which is at least better than it looked on Friday. Good showings by my Vismas (Vingegaard, Brennan, Van Aert - pretty lucky with how the final stage in Germany played out), Ciccone second as well today, but a truly terrible Renewi Tour with none of Nys, Morgado, Magnier and Del Grosso in the top-8 on GC.

Another big week coming up with chances for Vingegaard to stay in the jersey and score some more stage points together with Ciccone, and then Van Aert and Magnier are already confirmed for Plouay. The past week and the next three are pretty much the first and only time this season where my big guns are all racing a lot, so the stakes are really high right now.

 

[RedheadDane]

Renewi: Err... Asgreen, Johansen, Changizi, and Stokbro all made it to the finish, so... 5 points each. Yay
Deutschland: Blume in the top-50, another 5 points for him... weee...

 

[Earns1985]

Jezzz... Kooij now also at the preliminary startlist for Bretagne.
The only thing missing now is for van Aert to do the lead-out for Kooij at the end here too. If trhe giro wasn´t already enough....
#FreeWout

 

[Squire]

Jezzz... Kooij now also at the preliminary startlist for Bretagne.
The only thing missing now is for van Aert to do the lead-out for Kooij at the end here too. If trhe giro wasn´t already enough....
#FreeWout

My #CageWout campaign has been working well.

The #BrennanInChains one not so much though.

A bit disappointed with my Renewi haul. Magnier, Del Grosso and Penhoët all had potential to score more. And I had nobody at the pointy end in Germany.

Vuelta is off to a good start, luckily. I need to rely heavily on my Vingegaard/Almeida two-headed monster going forward, and those two could definitely move me above some other teams in the top 10 if they deliver. Also hopeful for some Riccitello points.

Dunbar on the other hand is looking like a complete failure of a pick. Has done nothing all season, and lost time already in the Vuelta. He's always been inconsistent, but now he's just consistently bad. Previously he has done at least one good GT per season over the last couple of years.

JSM is also a continuous disappointment, but that was pretty clear already quite early in the season. Vine is unfortunately a pure domestique in the Vuelta, but maybe he can do something afterwards.

All in all, with Vingegaard, Almeida, Magnier, Riccitello and a few others, my team has some good potential for the final part of the season.

 

[Earns1985]

So it´s still early days in the vuelta, but from the first stages, one could already tell who could play a role for the GC in the race.

So, as usual, here is a list of all the riders and how popular they are in our game.

	Popularity Top20	Popularity overall
Vingegaard Jonas	8​	33​
Gaudu David	0​	1​
Ciccone Giulio	4​	9​
Bernal Egan	0​	0​
Pidcock Thomas	0​	1​
Hindley Jai	1​	16​
Buitrago Santiago	2​	2​
Jorgenson Matteo	0​	0​
Ayuso Juan	1​	11​
Paret-Peintre Valentin	0​	1​
Almeida João	2​	4​
Kuss Sepp	0​	7​
O'Connor Ben	0​	0​
Cepeda Jefferson Alveiro	0​	0​
Lecerf Junior	2​	4​
Soler Marc	0​	0​
Pellizzari Giulio	3​	12​
Langellotti Victor	0​	0​
Riccitello Matthew	8​	17​
Landa Mikel	0​	0​
Frigo Marco	0​	2​
Tejada Harold	0​	1​
Fortunato Lorenzo	0​	0​
López Harold Martín	0​	0​
Gall Felix	7​	22​

Unlike on the tour GC, we have a very high density of riders here. I am in this list with Vingegaard, Gall and Riccitello. So a good team (especially because of Vingegaard), but I will not make up as much places as it was the case with the Tour GC.

 

[Devil's Elbow]

So it´s still early days in the vuelta, but from the first stages, one could already tell who could play a role for the GC in the race.

So, as usual, here is a list of all the riders and how popular they are in our game.

	Popularity Top20	Popularity overall
Vingegaard Jonas	8​	33​
Gaudu David	0​	1​
Ciccone Giulio	4​	9​
Bernal Egan	0​	0​
Pidcock Thomas	0​	1​
Hindley Jai	1​	16​
Buitrago Santiago	2​	2​
Jorgenson Matteo	0​	0​
Ayuso Juan	1​	11​
Paret-Peintre Valentin	0​	1​
Almeida João	2​	4​
Kuss Sepp	0​	7​
O'Connor Ben	0​	0​
Cepeda Jefferson Alveiro	0​	0​
Lecerf Junior	2​	4​
Soler Marc	0​	0​
Pellizzari Giulio	3​	12​
Langellotti Victor	0​	0​
Riccitello Matthew	8​	17​
Landa Mikel	0​	0​
Frigo Marco	0​	2​
Tejada Harold	0​	1​
Fortunato Lorenzo	0​	0​
López Harold Martín	0​	0​
Gall Felix	7​	22​

Unlike on the tour GC, we have a very high density of riders here. I am in this list with Vingegaard, Gall and Riccitello. So a good team (especially because of Vingegaard), but I will not make up as much places as it was the case with the Tour GC.

The threat looming over the top of the rankings is that Salvarani has no fewer than six of these riders. If the game is to be competitive after the Vuelta, at least some of Almeida, Ciccone, Gall, Hindley, Buitrago and Riccitello are going to have to do a disappearing act.

 

[Earns1985]

The threat looming over the top of the rankings is that Salvarani has no fewer than six of these riders. If the game is to be competitive after the Vuelta, at least some of Almeida, Ciccone, Gall, Hindley, Buitrago and Riccitello are going to have to do a disappearing act.

Yeah, that´s true. Salvarani has the best Vuelta GC team of all. Only good thing for us is, that he doesn´t have Vingegaard. Postmanhat´s team and Squire´s team are also strong.

@Salvarani	6​	Almeida	Ciccone	Gall	Buitrago	Riccitello	Hindley
@Qazaqstan	1​	Gall
@Devil's Elbow	2​	Vingegaard	Ciccone
@postmanhat	4​	Ayuso	Ciccone	Gall	Riccitello
@SafeBet	1​	Vingegaard
@triley36	2​	Gall	Pellizzari
@Popchu	1​	Gall
@Earns1985	3​	Vingegaard	Gall	Riccitello
@Squire	3​	Almeida	Vingegaard	Riccitello
@Senderos	1​	Pellizzari
@slow_climber	0​
@Jakob747	1​	Pellizzari
@abbulf	0​
@Berflamand	2​	Vingegaard	LeCerf
@EvansIsTheBest	2​	Vingegaard	Riccitello
@MADRAZO	3​	Ciccone	Gall	Riccitello
@Nyssinator	0​
@Fivezzz	3​	Vingegaard	LeCerf	Riccitello
@hayneplane	2​	Buitrago	Riccitello
@18-Valve. (pithy)	1​	Vingegaard

​

 

[Squire]

Okay, so I've discovered (or realised, rather) a very annoying thing about CQ point allocation. If you finish a TTT behind the rider on your team where the team's time is taken, you get zero points (except in Paris-Nice with different rules). Even if your team wins and you have contributed a lot, but finishes let's say two seconds behind the rest.

I find this quite stupid. And especially as it affects my team in this case, with Jay Vine not getting any points for UAE's stage win.

 

[EvansIsTheBest]

Okay, so I've discovered (or realised, rather) a very annoying thing about CQ point allocation. If you finish a TTT behind the rider on your team where the team's time is taken, you get zero points (except in Paris-Nice with different rules). Even if your team wins and you have contributed a lot, but finishes let's say two seconds behind the rest.

I find this quite stupid. And especially as it affects my team in this case, with Jay Vine not getting any points for UAE's stage win.

Yes we've discussed this in the Vuelta game. It's almost as stupid as the concept of TTT in the first place.

 

[Devil's Elbow]

Visma offloading the red jersey to a break from which Vine wins is some real CQ nightmare fuel...

 

[Netserk]

Ayuso on his way to a third year in a row as a bad pick.

 

[Earns1985]

Visma offloading the red jersey to a break from which Vine wins is some real CQ nightmare fuel...

To make the day even worse, van Aert skips Bretagne..
At least in l'Avenir I have the top3 of the day.

Ayuso on his way to a third year in a row as a bad pick.

Who would have thought this by end of march. He looked like one of the best picks at this time.
Kind of a deja-vu from last year...

 

[will-10]

Okay, so I've discovered (or realised, rather) a very annoying thing about CQ point allocation. If you finish a TTT behind the rider on your team where the team's time is taken, you get zero points (except in Paris-Nice with different rules). Even if your team wins and you have contributed a lot, but finishes let's say two seconds behind the rest.

I find this quite stupid. And especially as it affects my team in this case, with Jay Vine not getting any points for UAE's stage win.

the CQ points system for TTTs has been out of date with how the teams actually ride them for literally 20 years, but they don't want to hear it.

 

[skidmark]

Update #31: JumboVismaFan makes it two in a row

Another week, another start to a Grand Tour. The Vuelta started on the weekend after a flurry of races during the week, including Renewi Tour and Deutschland Tour. And the winning team was a familiar face from last week's races, it turns out.

This Week's Top Scorers

Rank	Team	Points this week
1	JumboVismaFan	681
2	Berflamand	530
3	Devils_Elbow	506
4	Hugo Koblet	485
5	SafeBet	482

Unique pick Arnaud De Lie is finally paying off for JVF, netting a whopping 333 points for winning the Renewi Tour after last week's good score in the Hamburg race. Beyond that, JVF has the ever-giving Matthew Brennan (128 points, 33 teams), a very good Sam Watson (95, 3), and contributions from rare picks Martin Tjotta (40, 4) and Sam Maisonobe (30, 2). Berflamand is a distant 150 points back in 2nd, but clears 500 points thanks to Brennan, opening weekend points at the Vuelta by Jonas Vingegaard (88, 33), and solid points from Fred Wright (119, 2) and Wout Van Aert (65, 60). Devil's Elbow clears 500 as well to land on the podium with a similar lineup.

This Week's High Movers

Rank	Team	Up/down
1	JumboVismaFan	(+6)
2	zigzag_wanderer	(+4)
2	Jon_Ezeitza	(+4)
2	Earns1985	(+4)
2	DJ Sprtsch	(+4)

JVF manages to double up this week, topping the high movers by moving up a good-for-this-late-in-the-year 6 spots. There's a 4-way tie for 2nd here, with 4 teams each moving up four spots.

Green Jersey Competition

Rank	Team	Total
1	Pantani4ever	316
2	Salvarani	309
3	Rufs	239
4	Devils_Elbow	220
5	Squire	185.7

Devil's Elbow scores 30 points on the week but doesn't move up due to the large lead of the teams above theirs. They are within striking distance of Rufs in 3rd, but it'd take more than 2 weekly wins without the top 2 scoring to get to the top.

Top 10 Overall

Rank	Up/down	Team	Points
1	(-)	Salvarani	12316
2	(-)	Qazaqstan	11615
3	(+1)	Devils_Elbow	11518
4	(-1)	postmanhat	11465
5	(+1)	SafeBet	11435
6	(-1)	triley36	11276
7	(+1)	Popchu	11153
8	(+4)	Earns1985	11006
9	(+2)	Senderos	10961
10	(+3)	slow_climber	10960

Salvarani loses almost 120 points to Qazaqstan this week to lead by a mere 700 points, but their Vuelta team looks pretty good so that gap has a better chance of going out than closing. Further down, there's a lot of jockeying around with teams flipping spots, and at the bottom of the top 10 we have 3 new entrants in Earns1985, Senderos and slow climber, who cause Jakob747, abbulf, and Squire to fall out.

spreadsheet link

 

[Blues in the bottle]

Hi Skidmark,

Sorry to bother you.

The spreadsheet for my team shows Michael Leonard with 0 points; however, CQ shows him with 114. Please note on the spreadsheet shows his middle name as Shea but CQ doesn't have a middle name. They may have removed that or I may have made an error when I submitted my team. Thank you for looking into this for me and of course thank you for making this game happen.

BitB

 

[Armchair Cyclist]

CQ added, and then removed, Leonard's middle name.
They do such things pretty regularly.

I notice that l'Avenir record Noah Hobbs as A.B.N. Hobbs: that should give CQ plenty of permutations to cycle through in the way they report his name.

 

[RedheadDane]

Weekly summary:

Bretagne:
Lund 9th: 52 points
Charmig, Honoré, Valgren, and Asgreen all finished: 5 points each

Vuelta:
Bjerg part of the winning team on the TTT: 17 points
Foldager 4th on stage 8: 15 points
Kragh part of the 3rd placed team on the TTT: 6 points, breaks even.

l'Avenir:
Øxenberg 9th in GC: 8 points
Bevort won a stage: 8 points
Dalby 14th in GC: 2 points

 

[Earns1985]

So with Vingegaard, Gall and Riccitello at the vuelta and Magnier in Bretagne and even Demare scoring a few points my expensive picks all looking in good form at the moment. Hopefully Lipowitz will score e few more points in the end of the season and also van Aert in his last three races of the season.

Most uncertainty are now the upcoming italian september one-day races, where again like in the july spanish one day races, Astana and EF will be the biggest compititors for the UAE riders, who will participate there.
Looking at teams like @triley36, who has del Toro, J. Christen and Morgado in his team, it will be very important, which riders UAE will send to Canada as support for Pogacar and which riders will be able to farm the points of these races..

07. Sep​	GP Industria & Artigianato	1.Pro
10. Sep​	Giro della Toscana - Memorial Alfredo Martini	1.1
11. Sep​	Gran Premio città di Peccioli - Coppa Sabatini	1.Pro
13. Sep​	Memorial Marco Pantani	1.1
14. Sep​	Trofeo Matteotti	1.1

 

[Devil's Elbow]

Most uncertainty are now the upcoming italian september one-day races, where again like in the july spanish one day races, Astana and EF will be the biggest compititors for the UAE riders, who will participate there.
Looking at teams like @triley36, who has del Toro, J. Christen and Morgado in his team, it will be very important, which riders UAE will send to Canada as support for Pogacar and which riders will be able to farm the points of these races..

Morgado doing the Tour of Britain for some reason makes me think he isn't going to combine that with the Canada trip.

Or at least, that's my copium take on why he's doing a race I didn't want him to do from a CQ perspective. Pretty horrible lineup there for me with nine riders who are mostly unsuited to the route or stuck behind Kooij and then no Uijtdebroeks on top of that. At least De Schuyteneer (who has an insanely farmy schedule for the remainder of the season) got switched to Istanbul at the last minute, but given that Salvarani and SafeBet both have him too he's only going to matter to my team if I start to drop...