Season 14

[Zatarra]

I had exactly the same with Harms, although he had a mechanical breakdown as well, but still... Also Stamer (7* hill) couldn't follow with 1-1 in the first two sections, but maybe he is just not good enough as a helper.

Still, weird that Harms couldn't follow the pack in sucksion 1.

[Aurora Australis]

Back in CFF2, when I had hillers, I remember that every tactic in the hill classics seemed to be wrong.

[Sjiz]

Ah well, this time Verbeek was unlucky. Other riders with lesser GV and helper bonus did make the cut in S1 and he didnt. I guess he got the unlucky draw this time. Tonight we go for redemption

[Vos]

Flèche Wallonne ;
6º Daniljev
26º  Xavier
This time a good race and a very good result.
Only after adapting the original tactics and I had no clue what the right tactics would be with several options. It was a lucky guess this time.
Xavier did an excellent helper's job, even in section 4. What is needed to get a top10 result in this fierce competition of great hills rivals.
Hopefully LBL will go very well too.
Also in La Doyenne my tactics are more guessing than knowing, it seems anything can happen with the high pace of some amazing hills teams.

[Vos]

Congrats Sjiz ! Verbeek did it again in the most important ( and only monumental ) race out of these 3 classic hills races.
Great LBL victory ! 

Liège–Bastogne–Liège ;
4º  Daniljev
27º  Xavier
Again a good result. 2 out of the 3 hills classic races went well.

Thanks to Verbeek, my team dropped one place in 1A and now 120 points behind TeamRHB.
It is up to Miorlin to close this gap in Romandie.

[Sjiz]

Thanks Vos, you are lucky that Verbeek was unlucky otherwise the gap would have been even bigger (what if, what if). But i am satisfied with the Ardennes. I expected it to be more difficult compared to last season but we were still able to perform very well in 2 races and were unlucky in the 3rd. 

LBL went perfectly. Struckov went all out in s1, Galunov in s2 and Lustig in s3. There were more teams with the same idea to attack in s1 and 2 but the attack in s3 was very effective. Valter, Wirth and Caldeira all dropped out of the first group. S4 was a great sight to see with Verbeek being paced by Poldolja. On the finish line Verbeek took his time to celebrate his 4th Lieja a real record (and 9th classic).
Maybe we go for his 10th next season .

In Romandie its time for Loinaz again

[Vos]

   selection SPORTLIFE

Miorlin is the undisputed teamcaptain in Romandie.
Lebrun and last-minute-buy Szarvas get free roles in their speciality to try to score a few extra points.

021 Miorlin ( 32 ), climb
022 Basov ( 31 ), climb
023 Nyheim ( 25 ), climb
024 Lebrun ( 29 ), sprint
025 Szarvas ( 32 ), cobble

Good luck everyone ! 

[Sjiz]

A good start for Loinaz: he lost only 15 seconds on Hilton in this cobble stage. Usually thats around a minute, so we should be happy with this. Now the real question will be answered: how well will he do in the climbs as thats where the major time differences will be made.
Lezhnev also picked up some points and after losing van Groningen he asked me to find a new team mate so we did: Jorgensen came over from Sportlife. Giving us high hopes for the BinckBankTour.

And another nice thing to mention: After Verbeeks 4th Lieja we were finally rewarded with the king of the hills achievement, thats fitting i guess for a rider with the most wins in all 3 hill classics and the record in 2 of them.

[Zatarra]

I have high hopes that Van Der Goor wil finally ride himself to a top20 spot in the GC. He prefers a little less climbing and a bit more hilling, but no TT in a your is perfect for him.

In the cobble stage he finished in the same group as Hilton. That was a bit disappointing, I was hoping he could even take some time there, but apparently I yet have to figure out the right domestique tactiques; Stamer was going too fast.

Tonight we'll know where she stand.

[Vos]

stage 1 Romandie ;
Szarvas ( 36º ) was not good enough to score points in a free role.
I guess that was too difficult for a last-minute-buy and therefore not a perfect health, in a race with many good specialists.
And I assume enough of them have still the TC bonus of Paris Roubaix.
But Szarvas can still be of use as masterhelper for Miorlin in sprint stage 3.
So, it is more interesting to see how my teamcaptain did in this cobble stage 1 :

96º  Miorlin  on 3:53"
Thanks to a perfect helper's job of Nyheim, who stayed with his teamcaptain in all 5 sections.

Although Miorlin is just a pure 9 star climber, he has also GC ambitions in Romandie, despite he has not a star on sprint or cobble.
He even won Romandie once in season 9.
But back then it was more suited for Miorlin with 3 pure climb stages, also I remember that the weather gods were in his favor a lot.
In this Romandie the flat skill is of much more importance, and unfortunately Miorlin his flat is not high. Nevertheless, I expect a good GC.

Miorlin lost much time to the real / suited tour cyclists.
For example this group of 5 finished on 2:17" :
Fredickson, Vonk ( 2x Combuijs ), Hilton ( CaptainOrange ), vdGoor ( Zatarra ) and Roethlisberger ( Valderend ).

With 3 climb stages in this little tour, the favorites of stage 2 might be GC contenders too. As always, Miorlin cannot challenge the favorites.
So, it is good to see that the favorites of stage 2 lost much more time in stage 1 than Miorlin did.
4 favorites finished in 5:37" and 5:26", only the 5th favorite of stage 2 finished on 4:32", what is not far behind Miorlin.

All this is nice to notice of me, but I have no idea who the GC rivals will be. Probably there will be many with this stages schedule.
And the TC bonus period Romandie + Giro will be of big influence too in who can ride a good final GC.
I estimate that there are many real tour cyclists with TC bonus here.
Hopefully it will be an interesting and exciting GC battle, and I expect/hope that Miorlin can join that GC battle too.

[Vos]

Lezhnev also picked up some points and after losing van Groningen he asked me to find a new team mate so we did: Jorgensen came over from Sportlife. Giving us high hopes for the BinckBankTour.

A bad trade/deal in quality for me ; yesterday I buy your former VanGroningen, and today you buy my former Jørgensen.

And indeed, your expectations of Jørgensen can be very high :
He can compete for victory in TdF stage 5 where he has an active weather icon.
But maybe more interesting is the later TC period BBT + Vuelta, so that he has TC bonus in BBT stage 5.
Vuelta stage 7 is also suited for him to compete for victory.

His main target is of course BBT. He can score a lot of points in 3 out of the 5 stages. But that is for sure not all ;
because in previous season Jørgensen surprised me by finishing 8º GC, and the BBT of this season is much and much more suited for him.
It would not surprise me if he rides top 5 GC easily (or even better), despite he is not suited for stage 1.
There he has to ride a good damage control tactic, and he has the advantage that his weather icon is active in stage 1.
And maybe his weather icon is active too in stages 4 and/or 5, but the weather in these stages is not known yet.

Good luck with Jørgensen ! 
And maybe you had already luck with him, because with 5 bids, your highest bid was maybe just enough.

Hopefully Jørgensen will not be the reason my team comes just 32 points short of finishing on the final 1A podium, just like in previous season.
Back then that very little points difference was versus Cabrasverdes, and this season it might be possible versus TeamRHB.
Now all preasure is on VanGroningen, he has to prevent such a situation of happening. 

[Davilo07]

Good luck with jorgi in his new team! I forgot to comment on the amazing result you got with him in Roubaix, his favourite race and the one he has been training for most of his life.
You have been able to get the very best of him, and this season I think it's been amazing with his second victory on d1 and that 2nd position in Roubaix. I think since his last season in my team he wasn't able to show this level of performance.
Hopefully he will show the same panache and ambition at rhb

[kirin]

So far, not an incredible perfomance for my team in my return to the first division, as the team is occupying a relegation spot rn. Still, not the worst situation, only 200pts behind OphiukoCT.
I have high hopes for Sven for this Giro and for Piñeiro here on Romandie and on the Tour, as it is a very mountain heavy one and that fits him pretty well. Maybe the manager will be for once right with his tactics.
Just today, Martin Xavier arrived to the team, probably at a higher price than he should be, but with this signing the roster is completed, unless the transfer listed Otto Gjertsen gets sold.
For the first Romandie stage, Piñeiro lost time with Hilton but not with other GC favourites like Rogers or Loinaz. Still, probably he could do better but Dukurs felt like running away.
Now for the mountain stages, hopefully Nieto won't do the same, this is the time for Piñeiro to shine and get time over the other contenders, since he will lose some time on the sprint probably.

[Vos]

Good luck with jorgi in his new team! I forgot to comment on the amazing result you got with him in Roubaix, his favourite race and the one he has been training for most of his life.
You have been able to get the very best of him, and this season I think it's been amazing with his second victory on d1 and that 2nd position in Roubaix. I think since his last season in my team he wasn't able to show this level of performance.
Hopefully he will show the same panache and ambition at rhb

Thanks Davilo07
I bought Jørgensen after Paris Roubaix of previous season 13, and for sure I had to try this season an earlier TC period for him.
And he did great with a stage victory in Catalunya in a CFF record, and his 2º place in Paris Roubaix.
I must say that he had an active weather icon in both races, of course that helps.

But the by far best result of Jørgensen is achieved in your team ; solo victory Paris Roubaix ( season 10 ). Very impressive, Davilo07 ! 

[Vos]

Just today, Martin Xavier arrived to the team

Good luck with Xavier ! 
Maybe good to know that he had many bids, so it could be possible if your bid was a little lower, someone else bought him instead.
And Xavier is 31yo, so he can be of use next season too.

I really hope you win the relegation battle in 1A, Kirin. The buy of a cyclist like Xavier is a good asset to your team to achieve that goal.
Also good luck with your team in this Romandie and in the upcoming Giro.