Big Donkey

[Robyklebt]

May

12th place in D1 with 11'033 points. 1 win. Giro, only 1 stage with Payot finally, second in GC, but almost 2' back. Concentrating to much on GC, without actually getting close, cost me rather easy Payot wins. Riding badly on other Payot stages cost me other Payot wins. Could have had 5, 2 gone with bad riding, got 1 in the end.
Rrurrambu was seldom allowed to sprint for the win, and then he failed, the one escape for the win didn't work either. Not a BAAD Giro, think I did at least try to put AAD under pressure towards the end, but still missed 1'30 and 100 energy on the final TT.
Rider of the season still Payot

- Guillaume, rider of the season, congratulations!
-Thanks, but I wanted rosa.
-Why didn't it work?
-Volta was stronger, finally.
-But couldn't you have won by riding more aggressively?
-When? Gran Sasso go for the stage, ok, maybe try an attack like FL did ourselves with Payot there. Ok. Crans? Rossi and Lekubarri vs Tesla and Prachar didn't look that good there. Bondone? With the long irregular finish difficult. Earlier on the way to 3 Cime? Ok, the very early try with Steiner the day before maybe. AAD just controlled well, was not easy to find or create an opening, Admittedly we didn't try to create that opening until late, but the parcours didn't present all that many opportunities before that either.
-So a failure.
-Yes, but no need to rub it in.
-Should Big Donkey have ridden for Steiner?
-No, I'm better. Like we did it was ok, keep Steiner in as long as possible, if there's an opportunity try with him, but there really wasn't any, unless you count the stage to Zoldo, when we had very bad connection with our DS. We had our car sent to the back of the caravan for some fairplay infraction it seems, some insults by Big Donkey that weren't even heard, but c4f installed microphones in our team cars. And since Big Donkey bougth the cheapest radios on the market, when the peloton was strung out we had almost no connection, weren't informed of the race situation very well etc. So no, the opportunity to try for Steiner never really presented itself.
-Second place, 1 win, a failure.
-Yes, we had that.
-So what now?
-Dauphiné, then TdF
-But you seem weaker than before the Giro, you seem to have already lost some of your spark in the mountain.
-Yes, since this morning I feel a bit tired, heavy legs. But that's probably because of the little recovery time after the Giro, and let's not forget that one stages 18-20 I invested a lot, 3 days in a row. It seems to have finally hit me now, maybe should have taken the whole week off, instead of racing and being back in training immediately. But give me a few days, by the time the mountains start here I should be back.
-Don't think that's the way c4f works....You're old, on the way down, you won't get better anymore.
-Look, we're humans, not some strings of data, I'm confident my legs will be back soon, will need them this week, then I take a break of course. Trust me, I'll be fine.
-You're in for a surprise I fear, but if you want to dream, ok ok.
-So Dauphiné, what's the goal this time? Third place and no win?
-GC and at least a stage.
-But Frost looks as strong as Volta really...his team stronger than Volta's maybe.
-We'll see, the TT clearly won't help me, but there's quite a lot of mountain after that, you'll see, I'll be there.
-OK, good luck then!

Finances
283'612, actually better than expected, only 100'000 lost in the Giro. So satisfied with that.

Training:
Blake and Matisse both missing a flat, not good, Verkerk 3 sprint, good, rest I forgot. Just copied it in my newish excel file, but closed it too early... idiot. Too lazy to open it again.

Retirements

Archibald Short. Joined the team 01.11.21, starting skills: 48-74-76-49-44 with 54 reg. Top skills: 63-82-77-49-44. 1637 points in 326 races, 18th most in the team. 1 win the GP de Wallonie in September 22, at least he won an important race. Most of his career was spent as a helper obviously. Short now has taken over as Directeur sportif, so we have a complete staff again, (well, no doctor), Short as DS, Drinkwater and Huizinga assistant DS. We expect Short to have a great second career!

New riders

Excelino Marquez from Riohacha, so surprisingly not from the mountainous regions, but from the coast. Carribean region, La Guajira department. Despite that, Excelino is an amazingly good climber, his starting skills 73-52-78-50-53 and 52 reg. 54.1 pavé, not too bad, can develop if his flat goes up, considering that he trained a lot on dirt roads in the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta it could actually have been better. Anyway, his goals are the usual, the Giro. 2024 in his case. For the moment all we expect is that he trains, he might give his debut in the Vuelta, might, not sure. San SEbastian before that another option. He will possibly be the leader for the Andes, if they are offered in the afternoon (unsure after the debacle 23) and we start (depends on the parcours too). So anyway, from October-November on, he can expect to be our leader in the mountains.

[Robyklebt]

July July! Barely over and the Donkey already writes his report

Damn, after having almost finished July... seems I didn't write JUne yet either?

Ok, June:
4 wins (+1 NC)
3 Dauphiné stages, 2x Payot, once Lekubarri
Place 6 in D1, 9704 points
Payot rider of the month
+1'507'383
Training see below
New riders and retirements too


Place 5 in D1 with 10'183 points. 4 wins. The big goal was obviously the TdF. Leader Steiner, time for him to get his chance. Had we ridden the TdS, he would have been the leader, but since we rode the Dauphiné, we went with Payot, so time for Steiner now. Worked out ok, he finished second in the end, but his hopes to ride for the win were basically over the moment Hill trained to 88. At 87 he was an ally, at 88 he was almost impossible to beat. He came back into the GC with an attack in the Alps, but even then it looked unlikely he could defend it aganist Hill, and he couldn't. Clearly beaten, hung on for best of the rest. Would Payot have done better? Who knows, but with age, his lack of success in the Giro and Dauphiné it was time for Steiner.
3 stages, we thought it would be Lekubarri to win one, turned out it was Rrurrambu, Verkerk and Steiner the TT. Very nice to win stages with the sprinters! And a TT with Steiner.

After the TdF only one goal, tenth and last win for Payot at San Sebastian, where he got his first career win. The Donkey in the end was too scared of FL, too afraid to lose against Clévenot. Knew that Payot's form was better, but still went for letting Clévenot do the sieb and attack on the last climb, his sprint. Should have tried to sieb with Payot at the first km, and possibly the second too. Or attack, but that costs energy. We would have been a few secs faster, but probably not enough to hold on vs free. Only chance maybe 2 km sieb Payot, no attack. Gives us a few secs more advantages and more energy, but not sure that would have been enough. So no great end for Payot's career... ah, next day Getxo, why not try win number 10 there? We tried, it worked vs Gaizka, we weren't sure about his form, but was for the Tour.

Rider of the season Steiner, 2nd place in the Tour, a stage, that beats out Rrurrambu's stage and great leadout for Verkerk at the Tour. No interview, since he's in altitude training, just in case we ride the Vuelta.

Finances
+1'671'437
Good month considering it included riding a GT with an eye on the GC

Training
Magritte good, Blake bad? Or was already before? Henri super. Forgot the rest.

Retirement:
Since I only now realized I hadn't written anything for June, do that together
01.12.21-30.06.23 Tim Bradman (Aus) starting skills 46-69-58-52-46 with 35 reg. With 72,3 pavé, Best skills: 50-89, 48 sprint and 86,3 pavé. 167 races, 1645 eternal points, 4 wins, 2 stages of the pavé Tour 22 the most important ones. His timing regarding PR was bad, still young when he rode it the first time, although already with 83 flat and 82,1 pavé, he ended up 6th, and too old in 23, with the same skills and the same result in the end. Not a bad career, just a big regret that Paris-Roubaix isn't ridden in October or so...Tim now went back to Australia where he works as a groundskeeper at a cricket club.

No time, we'll deal with Payot in September, after all he retired in August.

New riders
On 01.07.23 Riccardo Lorenzini from Firenze joined the team. Starting skills: 46-72-56-52-66, 41 reg. Sprinter. With flat, goal something like 50-75 and 80 sprint. Number 2 for Sanremo, otherwise should become the main sprinter over Verkerk pretty fast. So GT sprinter for 2024. For the moment he's number 4, soon to be 3, once Gamboa has his 5000 eternal points.

01.08.23: We bought the (minutes)older and hopefully better Longbottom-twin. Stanley. While Henry went to r Taka. Stanley's skills: 48-67-79-51-48 with 53 reg. A 60-80. Starting rather low, not ideal after our current 60-80es barely reached 60 (or haven't done it yet in one case), but being an early buy for 2024.. we hope will be ok. he'll reach 60-80 until the Giro. For the moment he's just there to give bottles to his leaders, we'll expect more from October on or so.

Goals for August:
Vuelta? Or no Vuelta? That's the big mistery for us too was early in the month, still now. no idea if we want to ride that or not. Or save our energy for the Andes? We keep thinking, but decision soon. So if the Vuelta, the first few Vuelta stages are the big goal, if not, we really have no specific goal, the parallel program goals would mostly be in September. Make money and try to win a race sooner or later basically. If no Vuelta, maybe Benelux? No idea yet.

[Robyklebt]

August

6th place in D1, 10'108 points. Finally 3 wins, although it took a while to get the first one. Hamburg with Isidoor from an escape, then 2 Vuelta stages, Steiner and Ceroni. So a good month in the end. Rider of the season: Isidoor Vanuystel. Finally his first win, same as Ceroni, but even if I think very little of the race in Hamburg, it being a one day race makes it more valuable then the Vuelta stage, Since Isidoor is busy riding the Vuelta right now, no interview.

Finances
+1'526'585. So a fairly good month, considering there's a few days of the expensive Vuelta in there. Although we are doing surprisingly well financially there.

Training
Marquez up to 84 with 23, good. Trutat 76 was in August too I think. So excellent, excellent.

Retirements

Guillaume Payot (Fra) 01.06.22-11.08.23 Starting skills: 73-54-74-52-45 with 52 reg. Topskills: 89-58-75-51-45. 11'979 eternal points, number 8 in the team. 2 stage races and 10 wins, only the 15th rider in our team that manages to win 10 or more stages, the 6th climber. So place 13 in that internal classification. 95 races, so 126,1 points per race, number 4 in the team in that. Number 60 in the game at the time of retirement (5000 riders). His most important wins, Flèche Wallonne, San Sebastian and a Giro stage. GC of Tirreno though probably his biggest achievement. 2 Dauphiné stages, a Down Under stage and the GC worth mentioning as well. His first win was San Sebastian, he had trained hard to repeat that win a year later, but failed, but then used the good form to win Getxo one day later, thus reaching the coveted 10 win goal. The Giro, the main goal of any self-respecting climber in the end was a disappointment, second place in GC, 1'55" back, much further than hoped, and only 1 stage win, could have been more stage wins, but there was a reason for only one (besides ineptitude by the DS) Forgot what, you can probably read all about it in the race thread. Still a successful career, Guillaume now has taken up climbing, without a bicycle, coming from a family of mountaineers he was always into it, although we forbid it during his active career, now he's back in the mountains, training for a K2 ascent next May.

Amancio Carpinteiro (Esp): 01.02.22-25.08.23 Starting skills:52-74-74-56-46 with 56 reg. Topskills 62-85-74-52-46. 2257 eternal points in 309 races, number 26 in the team. 3 wins. Hirado GP (fantasy) with a 70km attack, Brabant with a 91 km attack a few days later, Limburg in June 22 with a short attack 24 km from the goal. So a long range attack specialist in his youth, he then didn't have more success as he got older unfortunately. But with 62-85 was a strong 60-80 helper, which was his main role anyway. Amancio now is back in his hometown, Vigo, where he works as fitness coach for the local football team, Celta Vigo.

New rider
Magnifico Garcia from Aracataca, Colombia. 73-48-74-49-56 with 51 reg. Like Marquez an untypical colombian climber, since he comes from the Caribbean region. Like Marquez, his main mountain training ground was the Sierra Nevada de Santa Maria, which lies between their 2 hometowns. Training on the dirt roads there, Magnifico not only developed amazing climbing skills, unparalleled in the region we would have said if Excelino hadn't emerged from their a few seasons earlier, but also an aptitude for pavé/dirt road. 80 internal pavé. Unfortunately Magnifico seldom trained in the flat, often even asking his parents to bring him to the start of the climbs, just a few km away, by car. So with 48 flat, he really isn't ready for the pros many team thought, but his talent in the mountains is undisputed. His goal of course are the GTs, but with his sprint we hope he can do well in some one day races too. For the moment we only expect him to train, mountain but if possible also flat, we force him to ride to the climbs by bike. His nickname logically would be Magnifico, well his name, no need for a nickname, but since the local newspapers started calling Excelino Marquez "El Magnifico" when he first emerged in the junior ranks, when Magnifico emerged the newspapers were obviously surprised and at a loss. Now we have El Magnifico, first climber out of our department ever, now we get this other junior whose name actually is Magnifico.... so he was named "Su Excelencia" We hope that will not create identification trouble with Excelino when they ride together, 2 Magnificos, one Excelino, one Su Excelencia. Annoying journalists, couldn't they have called Excelino "Microsoft"? Anyway, we don't except any results for Su Excelencia for the moment, December tour, depending on the profile, might be the first race where we expect him and Magnifico to show there class together.

[Robyklebt]

September

Place 18 in D1 with 6887 points. Would have been a bit over 10'000 if Steiner didn't leave the team shortly before the end of the month. 2 wins, both of them Vuelta stages by Urs Steiner. Plus the youth jersey at the Vuelta with Marquez and the team classification.

So not a bad month, despite the lack of wins after the Vuelta. 11th for Lekubarri at the Coppa Agostoni, 3rd+4th for Steiner and Trutat in the Giro dell'Emilia the results in the 2 other important races of the month.

Rider of the season clearly Urs Steiner, but since he left the team he can't give an interview. An interview with him wasn't advisable anyway, he loves foul language, even when in a good mood, and currently his mood doesn't seem good.

Finances

+2'647'462, Vuelta payout while only 2 weeks of it makes it the best month of the year.

Training
Marquez +2 mountain at 86 now makes it very good. Steiner -3 down to 83 much less, and precipitated his departure from the team.

Retirements

Reinaldo Gamboa: Joined the team on 01.03.22 with the following skills: 48-74-72-49-63. Trained to 58-74-72-49-78. So not as high in mountain as we had hoped. 296 races, 4 wins and 5018 eternal points, place 66 at the time of retirement in the team (now 67) His most important win the 15th stage of the TdF 2022. His other important win was a Catalunya stage in 23. Still, it's a bit of a mystery how he managed to get to 5000 points, probably just a result of lots of races and the some placements in biggers ones. Gamboa now is back in Cali, joining the construction company his brothers started with his money during his career. We wish him good luck in his new career too.

Urs Steiner:

Joined the team on 01.08.22. Starting skills 73-56-72-54-53 with 52 reg. Best skills 86-59-71-55-53. A slow trainer, he was only at 82 with 23 and 24, Trainings at 25-26-27 and then 29 finally brought him up to 86. Logically he was the number 2 in the team for most of his career, got a stage each in Catalunya and Pais Vasco, plus a second place in GC in Catalunya. He finally got to be leader in the Tour and the Vuelta and finally delivered. A stage, the mountain jersey and second place in GC in the Tour, 3 stages and second in GC again at the Vuelta. Finally 10'029 eternal points in 95 races. Number 17 in the team at the time of his retirement 6 wins. Urs left the team with a barrage of insults, lots "xxxxPimmel" etc. heard. We're not completely sure what he's doing now or plans to do, but we expect he'll continue drinking, play guitar, although just as a hobby and well, more drinking. We wish him the best for that of course. And see you online, you son of a bitch!


New rider

Haregot Woldermariam, our first Eritrean rider joined the team today, 01.10.2023: His skills 55-71-78-62-50 with 65 reg. A future classic, for the moment he'll be used as an overprized early tempo rider. Long term of course we hope he devvelops into a 70-80, even if the 80 part seems difficult. Due to his high reg for the moment we plan to start the Giro 24 only with 1 classic, Haregot most likely, since it's the only one we have as well. With his TT he could be something for some smaller stage races too. Benelux, races like that.

[cataracs]

Why Giro24 with just one classic?

[Chemnitz Pro Cycling Team]

Poor Haregot has to ride without teammates

[cataracs]

Are you bullying him because he's African

[Robyklebt]

Why Giro24 with just one classic?

Taka taka taka taka.. it's written in the same sentence!

Due to his high reg for the moment we plan to start the Giro 24 only with 1 classic,

High regeneration. Means he will be fit again very soon if he ever goes under reg. Not my usual 40 reg classic (although lately I often had to make compromises and buy them with more reg) Can use him quite a lot on consecutive days. As well it means he will costs shitloads of money. If start with 2 climbers (which is the plan) then just this high reg guy should be enough. Now if he doesn't train, or I buy a second classic (will have to at some point, probably for Dec or Jan?) and that other yet unbought classic trains much better (unlikely until May if he comes in Jan, but who knows, then might start the other one, or both if Woldemariam is some sort of 68-75-78... but ok, he should be better than that by May

[Robyklebt]

October

Fast Donks, November barely started, and we already update our press center!
3 wins, Rrurrambu, Magritte and Trutat. Classics: Not a success, very frustrating, bad riding by Donkey, at least in the monument. Let's start with that.
Lombardia, stevens weird riding, ended up without the team in the last flat part, attack clear, it goes, Trutat hangs. Not Lekubarri, who was the guy that was fit. Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhh. Lekubarri was still on Ghirga from much earlier, in case stevens tried that card. Then when the attack was clear somehow the brain didn't react and change following. Third monument that I ride extremely badly in a decisive moment. Roubaix, after Gipfel had hilariously killed his team 50 km from the end (don't quote me on the exact number) in an attack of stupidity the Donkey rode for him. Attack planned, others were faster in attacking, attacking behind seemed hopeless, wasn't going to catch up, so ride and think of a plan. Turned out to be riding for a second place (that I didn't even get...) Ok, there at some point I tried the attack at least. LBL, instead of keeping Payot in front, dropped to help a classic, in front.. possible win, but ok, not sure if Schappy rides then.. probably not, he's not stupid, in a sprint had 0 chances. Still, since Payot-Rossi was caught immediately, leaving Payot in front would have been better. And now here... not thinking, seeing the attack, but simply not reacting and change the setting. Bad monuments season. But ok, at Lombardia at least I wasn't the only one riding badly, was matched or even surpassed by others. Stevens first siebing from low, meaning sieb with the guy that then will ride, so he gifted everybody extra helpers. Sieb from high! Sieb with a 77, ride up with your 62! Then the 52-61 that he carried along are dropped, and while they might come back, at least some other teams have to work. (Again, maybe the numbers wrong) Then he overdid it, used up his riders too fast, was left with Ghirga (I think) alone, couldn't control the end. Bad! Lost Lombardia like that. Lost? He won! True, but that's because the front lost it too, and later, so it was back to stevens. Front is through, 4 riders?, Trutat not riding, too dead, one goes out, then Medina goes out, the pretty clear favorite in front goes out, last km then surprisingly all out, Velasco goes over, wins. Hysterical. If I had Lekubarri in front, and then he would have been the favorite, wouldn't have happened. But looking at how Gipfel went out with Medina.... we wouldn't even have gotten to the last km ahead if Lekubarri was there, So nothing lost by being stupid for me, if I had followed the group simply wouldn't have worked. At least that's what I tell myself to recover from the shock of fucking it up so badly...

Last important race of the year, Paris-Tours, I have Lorenzini and the pavé guys as leaders. Group goes through. Easy. AAD with 2 sprinters and Watt number 1 favorite, even if Iwachnenko seemed highly unlikely to be a factor. Tukh with Deklavs, another clear favorite. Maybe he was number 1 as rider, AAD with the 2 options. And neither feels the need to ride. Made me feel much better about my ineptitude the previous day again.. Romoc at least tried, but coming on late, he then was dropped on pavé. Lorenzini survived it, but barely, fought ultra-hard on the last sieb km. The attack behind the long gone escape group on the *** after a 6 was caught by the loser group (that now was able to ride surprisingly, for the win they couldn't, for places, of course!) Anyway, Tukh+AAD the worst riding of the weekend, even our collective idiocy-riding in Lombardia was better than that, at least there we tried to win, here those 2 didn't. Not surprising in AAD's case, he has build a solid reputation for not riding for wins in 1 day races, (he claims the reputation isn't based on facts, the reputation is still there though, let him figure out how he got that one...) Tukh on the other hand usually a reliable chaser, too reliable grr. Ranbir. Anyway, a horrible end to the season, Horrible Donks in Lombardia, horrible race in France.

Other classics? Nothing, but there were less than usual, with Emilia already in sept.

15th in D1 with 7538 points, that meant relegation to D2

Rider of the month: Galarrwuy Rrurrambu. Winning Bernocchi in the end worth more to us than Trutat with Japan Cup, and whatever race Magritte won. Ah, big solo on a waffle. Nice, but it's not Bernocchi.

-Galarrwuy, rider of the month! For the second time in your career after December 22!
-Thanks, nice to get the award a second time.
-So which month was better, December 22 or October 23?
-January 23!
-That wasn't an option, December 22 or October 23!
-Well, last month then, last December I got my first win, very nice, but the team hardly rode after that. And the win was in Singapur, Bernocchi clearly is worth more. But really January 23,
-As I said, th..
-LET ME FINISH!!!January I won 2 races, a stage of Down Under, bringing attention to how underrepresented we aborigines are in Australian sports.
-Isn't it a bit late? Cathy Freeman did that years ago.
-I'm no Cathy Freeman, I never won an Olympic Gold... but I honestly think that my win at Down Under and later at the Tour, and Baykali's Australian Championship were the most important sporting achievements for us since Cathy Freeman. Let's hope we inspired more young aborigines to take up competitive sports.
-Ok, ok, whatever!
-Do you have any more questions?
-Your future!
-I will go into politics, will stand for election for the green party. To be able to help aboriginal Australians and of course my community on Elcho Island more effectively.
-I meand as a cyclist.
-No future most likely. I certainly feel the age now. Will ride a few races here and there, but the leaders for sprint now are Chassot and Lorenzini. I'll try to help them and help Baykali, hope he gets another win before his career is over. Unlike me, he's still going strong, even if he seems to be losing a bit of his explosivity too.
-Do you know when you'll retire?
-Probably after Down Under. I'll join the team there, if we ride, either as rider, or more likely as temporary press officer.
-WHAT?
-Yes, your job, I can do that better than you. But don't worry, will only be for that week. After that I'll retire and will use my talents for something more important than press officer of Big Donkey.
-Ok, that's it, thanks for the interview. Bye
-Bye

Training
Was probably brilliant, don't remember.

Finances:

1'285'131
Less than we usually hope, think we started quite cheap most of the time? Hoped for a bit more, but ok, riding Lombardia as badly deserves a lesser profit I guess.

Retirement

Raffaele Pecci: 01.04.22-27.10.23. Pavé rider. starting skills: 46-69-53-58-54 Top skills 49-84-5x-60-54 with 81.3 pavé. Hm, thought it was more? Ha, according to my press center, 47-70-54-59-55 at the start. Top skills unchanged. well, should be 55 sprint. Anyway 244 races, 1674 eternal points. 2 wins, GP Denain and a stage at the pavé tour. 5th in Paris-Roubaix. Sold for only 169'958, which has good chances of being the lowest sale of the year, an old goal of the team, that can't be controlled as well as it used to anymore.. data missing. Sniff. Most of the time he was a helper, leadership only in pavé, got 2 wins, so his career finally a success. Raffaele now is back in Pistoia, works as a dog breeder.

New rider:

André Chassot joined the team on 01.11.23. From Fribourg, his starting skills: 48-59-70-48-79 with 42 reg. We payed 1'863'681 for him A sprinter. And got praise from Kwick, which still confuses us, Kwick usually doesn't praise Donks-riders. His training: Risk at 21, flat and sprint. We predict that he will train +4+3 only, thus ending at 48-63 with 82 sprint at the end of November. We'll see how accurate my prediction was soon. A bit more long term his training goal is primarily sprint, if he reaches 88+, then we plan to go back to flat, hoping to get as high there as possible too. Most likely our Giro sprinter, fighting for the place with Lorenzini. Probably from January on he will be the first sprinter on flat races, until then Rrurrambu and Lorenzini should be the leaders.

Wilson Stringfellow, from Masterston, New Zealand, joined the team for 1'379'731 on 01.11.23 as well. His starting skills, 46-74-62-52-56 with 45 reg. A flat rider for Chassot, after praise from Kwick we were so high on him that we thought he needs one immediately. And Stringfellow good for our salary structure too. 45 reg a bit too high actually, but otherwise almost perfect. 50-high 80 the goal, let's hope he trains mountain fast and but my fearless prediction is that he'll miss 2 mountain trainings. No personal goals in his career really, he should be always in support of Chassot. Even if with 56 sprint (soon 55 most likely) he should be able to get some placements here and there.

[Robyklebt]

November

Goals the winter classics, won 2, Villalba with Marquez, Ouro Preto with Trutat, both with topform on their races. Our 2 only wins this season. Gotxon third in San Francisco the only other good result in the races that count. 5th place (?) in D2, 5221 points. Trutat with 303 points best pointgetter of the season, 1 of the 2 wins, so he's the rider of the season. 5 times top 5 in 7 races, Since he's riding in India right now, no time for an interview

Finances
1'401'787
100'000 below our usual goal, but considering we missed 2 races that likely would have resulted in decent profit, that's ok.

Training
Garcia 1/4, bad. Marquez up to 88 was this month I guess, very good. Rest some good, Matisse, some less, Stringfellow missing 2 mountain and Chassot one sprint... but with Marquez at 88 can't complain.

Retirement:

Patrizio Rossi: Joined the team on 01.05.22. Starting skills 56-74-67-49-49 with 59 reg, 74-79-67-49-49 his top skills. 3937 eternal points in 173 races. 2 wins, a TdF stage in 22 and a fantasy race in June 23. Career goal LBL, 8th place as leader. Good classic, lots of reg made him ride little finally, he wanted too much money to ride. He's now back in Prato, looking for a career as TV pundit, like his grandfather, Paolo. Problem is that cycling pundits are less in demand than football world champions as football pundits. Let's hope he finds employment!

New rider
Enea Novelli from Firenze joined on 01.12.23: Starting skills 54-70-73-52-51 with 36 reg. So a cheaper rider for once, cost only 1'468'641 to sign him, and his salary should not reach the stratosphere later either. Second classic, so his goal is something like 70+-77?. Should be at 66-7x end of February, so his chances to ride the Giro are actually pretty good. Expectations are a leadership, co-leadership in the hilly races from March on, mostly LBL of course. For the first few months we just hope he trains well, and he will probably ride quite a bit.

Season goals:
The winter classics and the December Tour. Try for GC and a stage in Tamil Nadu or Kerala. Or 1 each is ok too. Try to go up to D1 this month, riding the Dec tour we should get points. We start the month in 6th or 7th place, a bit over 1000 points behind the last promotion spot.

[Robyklebt]

January

January already over I was just informed, so let's review it. Edit; Now we were informed that we missed December too. Dammit. Ok, Payot rider of the season, training whatever, finances were there, retirements and new riders will be checked and possibly added at a later date.

Place 12 with 5298 points in D1, 22 races, managed to stay in D1, a positive surprise, after missing +/-20 races over Christmas/New Year. Winning the Dec tour was enough. January 4 wins, excellent, Trutat, Longbottom, Gurruwiwi and Lorenzini. Lorenzini winning a cat 2 in Mallorca is rider of the season:

-Riccardo, rider of the season, congratulations!
-Thank you.
-Finally your first win, and that was enough to get the most coveted award in c4f!
-Yes, he's an asshole.
-What?
-Oh, wrong answer.. sorry. But you told me the first question would be about Novelli, and that if I wanted to keep my job that was the only acceptable answer, decree from the Donkey.
-Ah yes, of course you're right, my mistake? So, let's start again, Riccardo, rider of the season, congratulations!
-Thank you.
-Is Novelli an asshole?
-Yes, he's an asshole!
-Excellent answer!
-I know.
-Finally your first win, and that was enough to get the most coveted award in c4f!
-Yes, nice to get a win even if I don't think it's that late. I'm a bit of a late bloomer, I wasn't as fast as I'm now when I first turned pro. So winning my first race with 27 was ok think.
-Not everybody agrees, but let's move on. The future.
-Obviously I want to keep winning. A win a month would be quite nice.
-Any special goals?
-Of course, Milano-Sanremo, Milano-Torino, De Panne, Scheldeprijs, Giro stages, something like that would be nice. But first let's concentrate on February.
-Ok, good luck then

Finance
1'023'509 so more or less in our 50k per race thing. Fine.

Training
Novelli is an asshole.

Retirement
Galarrwuy Rrurrambu retired on 31.01.24 He joined the team on 01.07.22. Starting skills 48-55-48-49-76 with 36 reg. Topskills 49-61-48-49-89, He 4119 points in 179 races, 7 wins. His most important win a TdF stage, followed by a win in his home tour, Tour Down Under. And Coppa Bernocchi. A good career, but his cultural impact was even greater. He put aboriginals on the sporting map again, Time magazine called him even more important than Cathy Freeman. While Freeman grew up in Queensland, Rrurrambu comes from almost exclusively aboriginal Elcho Island, with little infrastructure, little support early in his career. His success (and that of his younger friend Baykali Gurruwiwi) at the highest level gave and keeps giving lots of the young Islanders, they can succeed in sports. Rrurrambu now is working on the development of cycling on Elcho Island, he plans to stand for the green party in the next election as well. We wish him all the best in this new endeavour.

New rider

Ruud Koopman from Maastricht. 48-67-58-48-45 with 38 reg. A flat rider, although most likely never a top flat rider. A good man to keep the salary down, and in a few months he should be a decent flat rider as well. For the moment all we expect is that he trains, hopefully coming close to 80 in late April. And reach 80 in May or June. 50-82 seems a good goal. Until he has something resembling that of course we don't expect any results from him, and even after that he will have few chances to ride for himself. A career helper, bunking with Verkerk, who felt a bit lonely as the only Dutch in the team lately.

Outlook:
February only has one goal, Het Nieuwsblad. Where we'll fail once again. But we had an epiphany a short while ago: Maybe it would help us to win this and E3, 2 of our missing wins, to buy a rider with skills that actually fit the race! We are now seriously considering buying a guy with some sprint, some mountain, some pavé, to have a decent leader for these races in 25!
Long term outlook. Not too optimistic about the classics, but we'll try. Giro, the team is taking shape. Pre-selection:

Marquez
Garcia
Woldemariam
Novelli (asshole)
Longbottom
Almirall
Lorenzini
Chassot
Henri
Strongfellow
Magritte
Blake

Of course January doesn't only mean January, but also the anniversary of our teams c4f debut in 2006. 18 years! Lots of everything.
We'll keep this part short this year, less awards handed out:
Rider of the year: Guillaume Payot. 10 wins, 2 stage races, Tirreno and Down Under. Most important win the Flèche Wallonne. 2nd in the Giro.
Favorite rider: Gurruwiwi. It was Vanuytsel, but in the end Gurruwiwi overtook him.
Dumbest buy: Woldemariam. Expensive.
Most useful rider: Blake. He's also the most useless rider of course, Pavé leader that stopped at 79, started at 66, but still, 13 up is not all that much considering the higher percentages. So no pavé leader, not even a good active pavé helper, more of a battery on pavé. But a cheap rider that rides lots of 1 day races, has some reg, can do tempo, he turned out to be pretty useful.
Nicest win: No idea. Lorenzini was nice! Or at least I was very happy after he won, that's all I remember, 27th, that's just ok for the last year, first race on 28th it says (Thought it was 27th, but who remembers...)
Worst defeat: Many, the Monuments weren't ridden well last year. Hard to chose one between Roubaix, Liège and Lombardia. Let's chose Roubaix, maybe rode worst there.

Ok, enough awards. Viva Payot! But Urs Steiner in the end turned out quite well too, he just lacks a win like the Flèche to really challenge for the rider of the year award. But Urs "Ventil" Steiner is a legend anyway, he doesn't need public recognition.

[Robyklebt]

Damn, February was fast this year, must have been shorter than usual, January finished days ago, now already February!

February

16th and last place in D1, 3518 points, 2500 behind 15th place, was only 2000 at the beginning of the month I think.
3 wins Marquez in Bessèges, then Garcia twice in one day races, Muscat, where he had topform and Var. The big race of the month ended with a 5th place for Magritte, last in the first group. To have a chance to do better Magritte lacked a nice ally, somebody with similar skills, ok mountain, good pavé, little sprint, preferably with good downhill, to try to survive from the Bosberg till Ninove. And a good manager of course. Blake and Henri 14th and 16th.
Most points this season Lekubarri, 325, but only placements, few races, often placed, not sure how he got the points.
3 NCs won too, but that hardly counts. Even if Gurruwiwi's second national title was cool, started at little over 360, 380 we think, was almost at 0 energy the day before, attacked, the only other guy who showed up a bit later saw him with 2-3 or maybe 5 minutes ahead and decided not to try... would have been an easy catch and win. But Gurruwiwi keeps making Elcho Island proud.

Rider of the season is clearly Garcia

-Magnifico, congratulations
-Thanks!
-2 wins, no training.
-Yes, results are more important than potential, I think I proved that here.
-Yes, but don't you think will be more difficult to get results in bigger races with your lack of training?
-I train. I just don't improve much. What for.. Muscat and Var I can win at this level, I'll improve when it counts.
-Let's hope so. What are your goals for next season?
-We'll ride Paris-Nice and most likely Catalunya.
-But will you ride or will the Donkey make an alternative program for you again?
-I'll start, I'll start, I'm ready for bigger things. I'll help el Magnifico too if he seems he's in better position, but I won't start as automatic number 2.
-Let's talk long term for a moment. The Donkey has been floating the idea of starting with only 1 climber at the Giro. Excelino. Do you think it will happen?
-I don't know, if it does, that's the way it goes. Not that I think it makes much sense, but the Donkey is the boss. He's even been suspected of knowing what he does.
-Not very often..
-Well, some people seem to think so, so it has happened. They could be wrong of course.
-Of course.
-Is he around?
-No, think he's trying to spread common sense somewhere.
-Good!
-Back to the Giro: You still would like to start I guess?
-Of course, but as I said, not my decision. I would have wanted to ride in Colombia too.
-Tour? Actually the Tour seems more suited to both me and el Magnifico, so I expect us to both start there. Often in the past it was only the younger climber that went there, I think this year the Donkey will let el Magnifico start too, the leadership then is open.
-Vuelta?
-No clue...
-D2 next season, with a horrendously low amount of points. Are we going down to D3?
-The risk seems to be there, but don't think it's actually a real risk. We are more likely to come back up immediately. Next season we will ride 2 stage races, we will do well, we will score points, we will do well in Milano-Sanremo. The question is how well we'll do in the cobbled shit. And that gravel
-COBBLED SHIT? WHO ARE YOU, YOU LITTLE SHIT! YOU ARE SHIT. SHITHEAD. SON OF A PAVED ROAD! SHITMOUTH! SHITTY SHITSTER!!!!
-Anton Hasler, please, he didn't mean it like that. It's the hills he really dislikes in Belgium!
-Actually I'm very talented on cobbles!
-Well, if you'd trained your flat riding a bit more...
-We already have that, at the end of the day nobody cares about potential, it's results!
-Well, it's just past 1 o'clock at night here, the end of the day is far..
-Good point I guess. Anyway, who was that?
-Anton Hasler, security is trying to get him out now, some sort of team legend I think, old, but kind of strong still. He won Paris-Roubaix, I just checked, seems to have developed an obsession? He often hangs out here, little else to do in his old age it seems. Is quite nice as long as you just agree with everything he says.
-Oh... let's hope he doesn't show up anymore.
-Where were we?
-Cobbled s
-NO no no, please, he'll come back!
-Cobbled races in Belgium, depends how well Matisse and co will do there. Matisse is held in quite high regard by the team, but he never really delivers. But I don't watch that shi, sorry, those races, had enough of bad roads in Macondo.
-Macondo? Aracataca!
-That's what I said, Aracataca.
-Ok, times up it seems, was a pleasure talking with you.
-I hope we meet again soon. My time is coming.

Finances
+1'316'168 Our goal basically is 1'500'000 a month, so below that, but nothing tragic.

Training
Started of pretty average, then Henri, Chassot, Woldermariam, some Lorenzini, in the end turned out quite well.

Retirement
Nobody retired. Good I guess

New rider
Ceriel Bucquoy from Lessines, Belgium, 53-63-76-52-59 with 37 reg will join the team tomorrow. Our Milano-Sanremo leader for 2025, a hill sprinter. But Donkey, you'll say, you just bought Verkerk again! I'd say yes, you're right, but then I'm not the Donkey, just the press secretary. The Donkey says that a) Verkerk will win MSR 2024, so why not buy a similar rider? A compelling argument, I have to agree. And then he says that they are not identical. Which is true, Verkerk had only 56 sprint, but slightly more mountain. and no downhill. And less pavé. But a certain resemblance can't be denied. Optically though Ceriel is much more stocky. We payed an embarrassing 1'455'651 for him. so 110 too much, annoying mistake. (Verkerk was cheaper if anybody wonders, almost 100k)
Ceriel as fourth sprinter won't get many chances at first of course. But with Verkerk being 34 next season, it shouldn't take too long for Ceriel to take over the position as hill sprinter. Obviously not before the Giro, but from June on we expect him to bring in results. Maybe already at the Tour. While preparing for his career goal, Milano-Sanremo. We hope to bring him to 75 sprint, and a bit above 60 in the hills. Possibly focus a bit more on flat with him than we did with Verkerk, we'll see later about that though.

Goals for March
Many, Milano-Sanremo first of course. Paris-Nice next. And then all the other important races, from Strade Bianche to Ronde van Vlaanderen, although we fear that as usual we won't really have much to say in the outcome of that one. So in March we will not scout for a guy with high pavé as usual, but for a guy with decent pavé, but some sprint, a leader for the hilly pavé races in 2025!
-

[Chemnitz Pro Cycling Team]

No mention of your new band?

[Robyklebt]

March

1st place in D2, 9854 points. 7618 in March, in 31 races. 10 wins, so a successful month, very successful.
But let's go on chronologically
Strade Bianche: 4. H. Woldemariam 9. M. Magritte. Turned out better than expected, even if I have to admit that I don't remember details. Basically Haregot managed to hang on and hang on, missed the Gafurbekov attack, well, didn't think it would make sense following, so kept hanging on to the Taka-driven peloton and got 4th

Paris-Nice: Marquez second, 2" off in GC. Bitter... No. Not at all. I already had so much luck to even end up so close, no regrets there. Ok, except not winning Paris-Nice once again. But Marquez winning 5 stages, 3 could be expected, 2 pretty clear, 1 not really sure, the other 2 just had all the luck in the world. Small group, lucky Donkey, points jersey, can't complain.

Milano Torino: Great Lorenzini, 14th. Well, second in the sprint, only Takahashi better. Good action by 123 123 to keep the climbers far enough back after the first hill, then after the final hill the front group rode together way too well. Despite the fact that the winner seemed clear, 80% Baxter. BW second best sprinter in that group too, everybody rode, wild stuff. Happens, 22" back for the Takahashi group, we sprinters rode well, the front group was faster.

Milano-Sanremo: 1. Chassot 7. Lorenzini 14. Verkerk. GREAT. Season saved. 2024 pretty much a success. But... it was a disappointing race. Yes, now, 2 weeks later I already see it much more positively, I won! But it still wasn't a great race. c4f, like every game I guess, is a game of emotions. That's what you look for. Not the win, the attempt to win and occasionally the win is just the means to get the emotions. That can be a win, but can also be failing, losing. The frustration of doing everything right and then a mistake in the end. The frustration of no mistake at all and still not winning. The joy of winning after riding a perfect race (still looking for that one...) the joy of winning despite making mistakes, from the loss to the win. Or the frustration of thinking you've won it to lose it. Or the thrill of chasing, of being chased. Thrills abound. Not on that Saturday.
The plan was: 3 sprinters, super-train for MSR. But hard to make it work. Add 2 very good flat riders, 90-87. All at 100 form. Add Woldemariam for the Cipressa 5 after the sieb, the downhill and sort of the Poggio. Keep 6 riders fit. The problem, but in a way a blessing in disguise: Chassot with 48-67 very possibly the weakest sprinter on the Cipressa 6. And with Woldemariam, a decent but by no means outstanding puller for his km I'm not sure to come back to the sprinters group. Even if of course Henri-Stringfellow help a lot in the flat. But others with a 87-88, stronger classic, equal downhill, it's 5-6" at the bottom, not sure to come back still. So that weakness gave me enough reason to refuse work until the Capo Berta. I ride, one of my 3 loaders out of commission, no more 6 more or less fit riders, have to cut down to 4, my chances decrease a lot. The big risk of course is that the group goes through, if a guy with a 73-84-89 train refuses work... "But well, look, Chassot, Cipressa! And you only have 1 sprinter, hang on me, you can still beat me! You ride!" So in my fantasies I was looking forward to a stressful first 200 km, where I see my chances ride away, where I'm in tough verbal back and forth with half the peloton, stress, emotions, all released with a win or loss in the end, or with a frustrating group going through. c4f, emotions all around. Reality? First checked the sprinters, as expected, Chassot the weakest Cipressa man. Ok, plan is ON! Let's go for this epic battle of wills! Then....nothing at all happened forever. Nobody thought about attacking. Even if with RfM as leader of the classic faction you knew in advance that the classic faction would just wait for others to make their race, increasing the probability of a successful escape. Finally Tukh goes Donkey just does nothing, Giotti and Brunsketti do it. Somewhere around there discovered that there was a second 3 man train, Zizou, hadn't bother to check that. Hill-flat for sprinters, classics, that's all I needed to see. But reluctantly went in after Capo Berta, really thought this annoying Zizou should, but ok, I go. Cipressa sieb, last, ah no, one of the Zizoutrainman is further back. Perfect. Ride all out, next group caught on the 5 (not sure if the classic was in or out there, AAD group, might have gone out, was in at a moment) All in, others help, Poggio relied on everybody blocking each other, Woldemariam can't do it, worked, sprint, add Stringfellow to the train so to be able to start Lorenzini as late as possible, not to risk the 150 loss. Giotti dangerous, fucks it up (but I think I would have had him under control, maybe too optimistic on that one) Kehrer in Chassot's win goes too early, 100? 89 too... was a bit stronger, but if he goes at 50 he might win. Won, perfect, just no emotions.
But as I said, by now I see it already much more positively, unless I start writing about it... IN the end I did a hidden masterpiece. Not easy to start with 3 sprinters including the weakest Cipressa-topsprinter in the race. Keep the flat faction fit enough to then manage a sprint and win it. Not my fault that I wasn't challenged nearly enough, mentally or physically. Not my fault 50% of the field seemed to have no plan to win beyond "wait and get lucky", but for sure don't try anything, neither tempo to create an opening for classics (they, like hill sprinters didn't even try) or escape. I still did my race as I wanted and had to do it, won it. it's just that the others made it so easy to stick to the plan, wanted to see if I managed to keep the refusal to ride until the Cipressa (wouldn't be easy) wanted to chase hard after the Cipressa (only hard for Tukh), like this was just an emotionless win, give me the emotionally overloading defeat! Well, not now anymore, now I take the win and keep it.

Catalunya: 5 teams, one we chased away on day 1, professional offliner. 4 team race, boring as hell in principle. Kwick made it interesting, but it was Kwick-Big D. we didn't leave anything to the others. 3 stages for Garcia, GC and 4 stages for Kwick. Not winning Catalunya with a climber, embarrassing, but not in this constellation I think. Stage 2+3 I still had to pay attention to the offliner, he had the better climbers really. Stage 5 I fucked up, stage won, but less time gain than expected to Kwick due to that. But in the last stage Kwick was always going to gain quite a bit of time. I tried the offensive tactic, since it was only 12", so 2" ahead plus bonifications... didn't work at all, defensive better in this situation too, but think even with 20" more advantage and riding defensively it wouldn't have been easy to keep the time loss low.

Dwars door Vlaanderen: Matisse, great pavé, no sprint, didn't see many chances. But actually the profile probably fits him better than the hillier ones, even if there's no huge pavé sectors. 10 of 11 teams ahead, we reluctantly ride. Surprisingly weak Schappys, who helped chase too. Hilly sieb his 50es behind Henri, despite Henri's form being only minimally better than their form. More sieb, double attack, Matisse and a Schappy ahead, a few behind with Henri. Ride, looks quite good, not for Magritte but Henri getting a free ride behind.. attack, he doesn't follow. Hadn't put following in. Drinkwater, suspended immediately that is, not me. Not sure he could have followed, he already rode 2 or 3 flat km, which as we all know hurts a lot, but not even trying.. argh. So finally 5th place for Magritte. Actually we rode a very good race with the exception of that following incident.

Ronde van Vlaanderen: Matisse, he will almost certainly finish in the first group, and almost certainly have 0 chances to win there. So escape. Looked rather promising, and went through. Vanuytsel with 39 sprint not ideal, but we didn't know who else to send. Blake would have been best, had the idea too late, 20 minutes after the race or so. 4th for Isidoor, in the back Matisse last of the first chasing group, 5th there, 9th overall.

Rider of the month is: André Chassot. Winning Sanremo, the most important race of the month, pretty clear. Even if Marquez-Garcia die well, with 5-3 stages, but both failed in the GC. And even with GC, Sanremo just bigger.
-André, rider of the month, congrats!
-Thanks.
-Finally your first win on the 15th in the Bredene Koksijde Classic, then a day later Milano-Sanremo. Your career finally took off!
-Yes, management was getting a bit nervous, and to be honest I wasn't too happy with my results until then either. But on the other hand I didn't get all that many chances. 35 races ridden until now, not always as leader. But it's a good feeling finally winning.
-Especially Sanremo
-Of course. Sanremo was the most important race in my career. Giro, Tour, that's goal too, stages and points jersey, but a win in Sanremo is what makes my career a success already.
-So no need to give it all anymore?
-I didn't say that. I'll try in every race, as usual.
-Sanremo, can you tell us how the race went from your persepective?
-Not much to say really, it was a calm race, I was well protected. On the Cipressa I tried to hang on as well as I could, was dropped, but Henri, Stringfellow and Haregot stayed with me, and accelerated well after the hardest moment had passed. Never had problems in the Poggio, downhill went well to, then the sprint.
-Were you ever worried in the sprint?
-There's no time to be worried, I'm busy sprinting. We started off a bit slow, a controlled sprint by Stringfellow, but ready to react if somebody went early, then Verkerk, then Lorenzini and I just had to go at 100 meters. No time to look what happpens behind me, went full power at 100, it worked, I won.
-Big Donkey record winner in Milano-Sanremo! Did it help riding for the team of such a tactical genius?
-Not really, it's 2024, who cares about what he did in 10 years ago? Plus people tell me it was actually Petit Singe that won the first Sanremo for the team. Oldtimers say he was a better sprint manager than Big Donkey. We just rode our race, what the team did in the past didn't affect us, has nothing to do with this year.
-It seems to be really important for the Donkey to be recognized as MSR star....
-Donkey, MSR record winner! I'm amazed! What a great manager. I'm happy to have contributed a win to it! Good like that?
-Should do, thanks.
-What are your goals for April?
-Not much really. We don't plan to ride any stage races, Scheldeprijs is not in my program, so I'll just see if I can strike in some lesser races.
-Ok, good luck then, and congratulations again on your award!
-Thanks

Finances
+2'277'374 Clearly a good result.

Training
Garcia 85 finally, Chassot, Marquez with flat, STringfellow up to 87, Pretty good month too.

Retirement
Baykali Gurruwiwi (Aus) 01.09.22-17.03.24 Starting skills 53-70-54-51-55, 36 reg, best skills: 59-86-54-51-55. 1799 points in 345 races, no. 12 in the team at the time of retirement. 3 wins, 2 of them national championships, so not worth much, but for a rider from Elcho Island still a historic win. A win in a minor race in January 24, at 37 of age his other win. For most of his career helper for his great friend Gallarwuy Rrurrambu. Despite his 55 sprint he didn't get the chance to ride for himself too often. Baykali now wanted to join Rrurrambu at home, Elcho Island, building infrastructure for sports for the young islander and join him in politics too. But after an emergency at our team he agreed to sign a 13 month contract to work as assistant DS for us.

New rider:
Custodio Fortuny from Barcelona joined the team on 01.04.24 for 1'545'451. Starting skills: 51-69-50-55-52 with 37 reg. 72.9 pavé, so 82 internal pavé. His goal obviously is the spring 25. With more sprint than Magritte, we hope that he'll have a few more options for the win than Matisse usually has. Originally we wanted to buy a rider like Paul Gray, who joined Felsenland instead (we didn't have enough money to make an offer anyway) 54-71-78-46-60-69.8-37. So less pavé, but more mountain, downhill and sprint, good for the hilly classics. But in the end we preferred getting a more traditional Donkey pavé rider, 1 reason was that we could't find any youth prospects with similar skills to Mr. Gray, the other, more important reason was Custodio's name. Custudio, custodian, guardian. Fortuny, luck. So the guardian of the luck? After all the luck we had in March, a guardian of our luck is very necessary, when our scout said the name, we already knew we'd sign him, even before he talked about his skills. Training... flat and mountain. He starts with less mountain than Magritte had 54-69-48-54-47 with the same pavé and 38 reg. So -3 mountain, +2 downhill, +1 TT and +5 sprint for Custodio. To be competitive in Flanders, he'll need to train very well, but if in the end he is only there for Paris-Roubaix, that's ok too.

New assistant DS:
As mentioned above, Baykali Gurruwiwi joined the team as assistant DS. After Drinkwater's bad performance during DVV, we suspended him and approached Gurruwiwi. After protracted negotiations, he joined the team in his new role on 01.04.24. (Since yesterday he's suspended , but that's a detail) It turned out to be quite an expensive deal for us. In addition to Gurruwiwi's salary we have to support Rrurrambu's sport center with 10% of our income every month (it took Ferdinand Gygax, our accountant (unofficial) quite a bit of work to make it possible to do that while keeping our earned money too, at least on paper. And we have to sign at least one rider developed in Rrurrambu's sport center in the next 13 months.

Goals for April
The Ardennes, Paris-Roubaix. Everything else secondary.

Stats from the first page of this press center, inspired by FL doing that a few times last year
We finally figured out our identity! Not TTT team, not sprinter team, not GT team, what we are is a March stage race team:

1 win in Paris-Nice, ok, not that impressive, but clear stage win record holder 16 stage wins (my records here say 18?), seems 2006 is being ignored ingame.
4 GC wins in Tirreno-Adriatico, co-record holder with Skullz. with only 6 stage wins 5 behind the number 1. In 7 participations.
5 GC wins in Catalunya record holder, 22 stage wins, record holder too. 9 participations. like for Tirreno over 50% win rate.

Overall we should be number 1 at c4f in these 3 March stage races! (Now we need to work on GC wins in France...)

Paris-Nice 1 win
2006 13. D. Rous 18. F. Sitzmann 2 étapes A.Hasler T. Kühlschrank
2008 1. N. Pucci 5. H. Hochuli
2009 2. P. Ruiz 4. F. Gygax 2 étapes, F. Gygax et P. Ruiz
2011 3. S. Urganov 13. B. Qian 1 Etappe, F. Conti
2013: 7. R. Momyshuly, 20. N. Legrand, 1 Etappe R. Momyshuly
2014: 2. P. Groselj, 7. G. Lajeunesse, 19. S. Poggi, 2 Etappen, M. Creek, P. Groselj
2016: 7. I. Wassberg
2017: 2. E. Zipoli 4. A. Uppdal. 1 Etappe, E. Zipoli
2019: 5. Hir. Matsuyama 10. H. Matsuoka, 1 Etappe, H. Matsushita
2020: 4. F. Antinori, 8. T. Armas, 1 stage, T. Armas
2022: 2. A. Basterretxea 4. I. Ardila, 2 stages, J. Löffel, A. Basterretxea
2024: 2. E. Marquez 11. H. Woldemariam. 5 stages, 5x E. Marquez, points jersey E. Marquez

Tirreno-Adriatico4 wins
2007 ?? Lost results, but catastrophic
2010 1. Y. Gamov, 15. I.Buonarroti, 1 Etappe Y. Gamov
2012 2. D. Mattarozzi
2015: 4. V. Dourado, 1 Etappe, MZF (MacBradaigh, Poggi, Dourado, U. Tobler, Topal, Cayetano, Umesao, Vargas)
2018: 1. L. Zafzaf 9. E. Tobar, 12. S. Vienuolis. 3 Etappen, L. Zafzaf. Punktetrikot L. Zafzaf
2021: 1. T. Eiffel, 3. M. Apicella, 7. B. Faye 15. J. Coderch, 1 stage (T. Eiffel), team classification
2023: 1. G. Payot 11. U. Steiner, 1 stage, G. Payot

Volta a Catalunya 5 wins
2011 10. O. Fahrny, 14. B. Qian 18. S. Berlogea 21. O. Uchigasaki 4 Etappen (F. Conti) + Punktetrikot F. Conti
2012 1 O. Fahrny 2. Y. Ramirez 17. C. Todea 1 Etappe, O. Fahrny
2013 1. M. Trapani, 15. N. Legrand, 16. R. Momyshuly 23. D. Sekiguchi, 2 Etappen, M. Trapani, 1 Etappe D. Gao
2017: 4. A. Uppdal, 5. J. Sax 14. D. Kehrli. 1 Etappe, A. Farkas + Teamklassement
2018: 1. L. Zafzaf, 2. C. Aeschlimann, 8. S. Vienuolis, 1. Etappe, L. Zafzaf
2019: 1. His. Matsuyama 11. Y. Son, 2 Etappen, H. Matsukaze, His. Matsuyama.
2022: 1. I. Ardila 4. A. Basterretxea 7. T. Espariat 10. R. Huizinga. 5 stages, 3x M. Gabel, I. Ardila, T. Espariat.. Team classification
2023: 2. U. Steiner, 6. G. Payot, 20. P. Rossi, 2 stages, R. Gamboa+U. Steiner, team classification
2024: 2. M. Garcia 4. E. Marquez, 3 stages, 3x M. Garcia, mountain jersey M. Garcia

[Robyklebt]

April

Not a good month. 10th place in D1 with 11'104 points. 2 wins. A fantasy race by Chassot and a Romandie stage by Marquez.
Classics? Bad.

Scheldeprijs: 30. Blake. But probably there was a sprint issue that day? Lorenzini 40.? Or I forgot to sprint? Not good, might have been better to bring Chassot anyway.

Roubaix: 20 man group at the finish. Magritte 11, Henri 18. Siebing not very effective, "new" pavé or bad siebing strategies, a bit of both maybe? Wasn't me that tried the siebs, stronger sieber there, highly uneffective on the Carrefour de l'arbre. Henri did a good attack at km 254, after the *** pavé, on *, after the Henri group came back to the front. But too strong sprinters there and they decided to wait and waste time by waiting for another attacker just behind. Lost 3" there? That was it, attack was good, Donks has to praise himself. Attack on *** with Magritte probably better, but probably get high sprint followers anyway. And Roubaix is not worth riding for 3rd place or so.

Brabant: Missed it, rode Abruzzo. Which is ok, like it, but somehow got tired of it after winning it once the way I wanted to win it. Even if the course probably is slightly different now, not a big goal anymore.

Amstel: That one was good. Verkerk in topform, we didn't ride. Best way to ride Amstel, 2 years in a row now!

Flèche: Second, beaten by Flopp. Great Flopp, helped the whole race, took the risk of following, it worked, he won the sprint. Still, had counted on Flèche to save my season. Only second, team in crisis.

Liège: Attack by Kwick, Marquez follows, Marquez dropped later, Still 5th. Woldermariam from the back 12th. Did very well there actually. But if it's for the win, he does less well, others ride more sensibly, After the Kwicktack the peloton was a mess anyway. Donks actually good, he rode a bit after the attack to keep it in striking distance, despite having Marquez there. Changed to riding for placement later after everybody else kept not riding but attacking for no reason at all.

So, highlight Amstel, rest... don't think rode that badly in any of the races, good attack Roubaix, didn't do enough with Matisse though. Liège had the right wheel, but hard for climbers. And Woldemariam is just 72, what to do? Flèche despite all the frustration, not much wrong. Ok, not perfect helping for Marquez, that might have hurt in the final km, those 20 or so energy? 30. Otherwise was more Flopp doing the right thing than me doing the wrong thing.

Rode 2 stage races, Abruzzo for some points, Romandie the same and because the parallel program looked amazingly bad. 1 sprint? Brr. And needed points to avoid relegation danger that was starting to worry me. Garcia second in a Abruzzo stage, somehow have the impression I thought I should have won it, but forgot details. MArquez then won a stage in Romandie, lucky as hell, his companion in the last 2 km forgot to sprint. Otherwise would have been second.

Rider of the season: Excelino Marquez

Interview:
-Excelino, you lost the Flèche Wallonne. Bye
-B..
-Ah ah ah ah... no comments please. Loser! Out of here!

Training
Almirall! Stringfellow, Longbottom ok too. Novelli a double, but... No Wolde, no climber (ok, old by now) no Chassot, still Almirall and co were good, so ok.

Finance:
+864'761
Clearly not good.

Retirement:
Isidoor Vanuytsel: 01.09.22-05.04.24 Starting skills: 50-70-78-49-50 with 56 reg. 70.6 pavé, Top skills: 59-83-79-48-49? Or 60-84? 79.7 or 80.4 max pavé anyway. 2693 points in 283 races, 1 win. The win at the Hamburg Cyclassic, from an escape. Tried to repeat the feat in Flanders, didn't work. Mostly helper, while we were big fans of his at the start, we cooled down a bit towards the end, except his win in Germany he seldom convinced, when he had a chance to ride for himself. Isidoor wanted to join the team as DS, but his tactical know how didn't convince us, so now he's trying to get a job with other teams, in the meantime he works part time as a construction worker.

New rider
Tapihana Uru from New Zealand, joined the team on 01.05.24. Starting skills: 56-71-69-46-44 with 35 reg and 65 pavé. A classic with not much flat, we had that quite a bit lately. But no reg, good mountain starting skill, we overpayed! Value 1'484'563, we payed 1'614'161. Despite his lack of sprint and flat, we're quite happy. A cheap classic, even if we maybe overdid it, but the shock from Woldemariam still sits deep, better another cheap one. like Novelli, hopefully not as cheap as that asshole who doesn't train... He will spend the first months training, but with Woldemariam and his salary demands, Novelli and his lack of quality, he could get a bigger role quiet soon. Tour start is possible as well, but we'll see. Goal is 70+-78?. Career goal: Good helper for the Giro 25, and leader/helper for Liège 25.

Goals for May

Giro: Only the Giro. Oh, Frankfurt maybe, after the fact possibly. But 2 sprinters have their topform there... Giro GC, we're not really hopeful for that, even against Krausz is very dificult, and if some even stronger TT guys join, it will be even harder. So first goal is stages, stages, then if we are less than 2' back before the last week we can think about GC again. If we already won 2 stages or so by then. The team is still undecided, Marquez-Lorenzini-Almirall-Longbottom-Henri-Stringfellow are sure now, Garcia (mountain!), Woldemariam (classic, reg) Novelli (Italian, weak classic, cheap) Magritte (flat power) Ceroni (old, but reg) Chassot (sprint) are fighting for the last 3 spots. With Blake not being ready, but still a possibility, sucky, but reg and less downtraining to be expected than Ceroni. Basically it's combination stuff, Garcia-Wolde-André5000 is out. Chassot would probably mean Matisse and Woldemariam, Garcia would mean Novelli and Ceroni/Blake or Magritte? Woldemariam would mean... Novelli and Magritte? (with Wolde no reg needed) But maybe Wolde and Chassot? Or some other combination... we'll think about it.

[Robyklebt]

May

9th place in D1, with 10'984 in 28 races. 7 wins, so a good month. Good wins too. Verkerk with his second career win, after a TdF stage in 2023 this time he won in Frankfurt. Then 2 sprint wins for Chassot in the Giro, and 4 mountain stages for Marquez.

Biggest goal of the season, of the year, of course the Giro. But since the route this year was very unfavorable for my climbers, started with only one climber, Excelino Marquez, going for stages, and then 2 sprinters, Chassot and Lorenzini. No try for GC at all, not even pro forma, just didn't make sense. Maybe with a guy like Wörns in the race that would have forced Krausz to ride more aggressively there might have been a small chance, but like this unless AAD goes offline... none really. So all for stages. 10 years after the last sprint win at the Giro, Creek, finally Chassot delivered. The teams favorite win of the Giro. He added a second one later, was the only challenger left for Natanzon for ciclamino for a while, but Natanzon's third win then basically finished that. And allowed CC to sprint for Smith in the last stage. CC with his train really too strong almost, but good that he kept going for sprint when the chances for wins decreased, due to falling form. Lorenzini with early form too, his only small chance was in the first sprint probably, but FL decided to rather do a light trick sprint, dropping into a train that was a bike length or more behind where he was, than risk something. Anyway, 2 stages for Chassot, after Sanremo, career a success!

Marquez with late form, Brocon, stage 17, so a bit later than most others I would have expected, and it turned out to be correct. McMell early form, at 34 right thing to do, risk of downtraining. Got 2 wins. Then Livigno, the first win for Marquez, beating Krausz in the sprint. After the rest day, same, Marquez wins the sprint vs Krausz. Here I was a bit worried, had hoped to get rid of him this time. But then Brocon it worked, while I'm happy with wins, wanted to drop the 87 Krausz. Managed with 100 form. Sappada then played it too loosely, had 3 wins, had 5 wins in total, so just did a "cool" attack, instead of doing the most promising thing, ride, sprint. Monte Grappa then the early attack, too early possibly, but nobody reacted, very easy win finally, and got Marquez the second place in GC as well. Meldrum started reacting too late, only in the last kms of the climb. Going early was logic, but maybe that early a bit too much, but since it worked...

Final results:

GC:
02. 00:02:07 Excelino Marquez (Big Donkey)
12. 00:12:27 Haregot Woldemariam (Big Donkey)
27. 00:53:26 Enea Novelli (Big Donkey)

Marquez and Woldemariam did well, Woldemariam with middle form tried an attack in his stage, but well, no chance. Novelli was just there loading Marquez mostly. Lack of better options, so he came to the Giro.

2nd places in points jersey and mountain jersey for Marquez and Chassot.

Rider of the month: All 3 winners would deserve it, but with 4 stages finally it's once again, Excelino Marquez

-Excelino, apologize!!!!
-Hi... eh what for?
-The Flèche Wallonne!
-Dammit, McMell just was very good that day, not my fault!
-APOLOGIZE!
-No, would have liked to win, but McMell was better.
-Bye!
.
.
-Come back, the Donkey just told me I still have to interview you, even without apologies!
-Ok, apologize!
-ME? I didn't lose the Flèche!!!!
-APOLOGIZE!! For the lack of manners, demanding apologies from a 4 stage winner of the Giro!
-No!
-Bye!
.
.
.
-Excelino, come back, I'm sorry! The Donkey told me to do the interview and apologize!
-So apologize!
- I just did!
- Not enough, by... ok ok Donkey, I stay, is ok, is ok, no need to get angry, me and press center guy were just joking, isn't it so, press center guy!
- I wasn't, yes, yes, joking! Excelino, nice guy! Mr. Donkey, can we do the interview now?
Uff, he's gone! Ok, let's get over with this... 4 stages, after failing in Huy, what are your thoughts now?
-The route of the Giro just wasn't good for us, for a GC run, so Mr Donkey, the great Donkey,
-He's gone, relax!
-Ok, that Donkey only sent me. With Garcia we could have hoped for winning in Prati di Tivo as well, Oropa too I think, but GC would still have been hard. So acceptable decision I think.
-Which win was the nicest?
-Monte Grappa obviously, we attacked, nobody reacted, then we just cruised to an easy win. Livigno was nice too, first win, pressure gone, that was important.
-Pressure after failing in Belgium.
-No comment.
-You really don't want to apologize?
-No.
-Ok, next Tour de Suisse?
-Yes, presumably. I expect both me and Garcia at the start.
-So Garcia leader, after all your history of failing is a bit worrying, no?
-Not at all, I expect to be leader.
-Aren't you getting old?
-Of course, everybody gets older. Basic biology. What's your point?
-Old and weak and failing even more.
-You look older than me....
-A few days, at most..
-Not on this world, it's years, if not decades
-Days, decades, details.
-Do you have any sensible questions left?
-Of course, I'm Mr Sensible!
-Ah,, finally we know your name, you're listed as anonymous on the start page! We're all wondering who you are, now we know!
-That's not my actual name...
-Oh, ok.
-So, what's your goal for the Tour de Suisse?
-As it stands, at least a stage and the GC win.
-Confident you'll do it?
-Well, yes, but I'm also a realist, I will have my chances, Garcia will be a good second card to play, but with Tarabesh, possibly Krausz we will have good opponents, maybe others too. With the route this year though I, or Garcia, can beat anybody I think.
-Ok, what about the Tour? Will the Donkey send both climbers or only Garcia?
-Sensible question, you did it!
-Well, you say captain, I say what!
-What?
-Wrong way around, but ok, answer?
-We'll see, I don't know. I haven't studied the TdF route in detail yet, but it certainly looks better for me than at the Giro. So I think it would make sense to send us both. But maybe the great Mr Donkey
-He's gone!
-No no, I saw him behind the pillar there! He's so fat, he can't hideas I said, the great Mr Donkey might want to give Garcia the chance to ride for himself. And earn some money.Once a lifetime, twice a day, If you don't work you get no pay.
-True, but he gets payed if he rides, regarldess of your presence.
-Right, but well, we'll see.
-Ok, do you have a favorite race?
-I been to the east, I been to the west, but the races I like best, are the ones undressed.
-Eh?
-Now you say wot, eh?
-Ok, I want to watch Chassot in Brussels! Go away. Brussels, Belgium, but he won't fail!
-Ok, allez André!

Finances

+1'309'712 So ok, relatively high salary for a stage hunter team, Woldemariam, so even with getting second place in the end stayed below my usual goal of 1.5 millions a month. But since it's Giro month, that's ok. Of course if I had a 10k cheaper classic, I would have made those 1,5 millions...

Training

Good Bucquoy and Fortuny, not much else if I remember correctly. Novelli finally 70 after the Giro. Asshole. Almirall up to 62 mountain, nice too. Ok I guess, Koopman a bit problematic lately.

Retirement

Gotxon Lekubarri: Starting skills: 56-69-71-48-55 with 54 reg Top skills 75-76-71-48-55. 6100 points in 209 races. Number 46 in the team at the time of retirement. 2 wins, with 55 sprint a bit more wouldn't have been surprising. An Algarve and a Dauphiné stage. 45 times top 10 explains the rather high amount of points in his career. 5th in Liège-Bastogne-Liège his best classic result. Gotxon now moved back to Bilbao where he works in an animal shelter.

New rider

Pahikore Taiaroa from Nelson, South Island, New Zealand. 46-67-54-53-56 with 54 reg. A flat riding machine, or escaper with his sprint. Good in case we have to ride for stage wins or GC next year at the Giro, with his reg he can do a lot of work. Goal is 50-80-50-50-55 basically. A bit more flat, up to 81/82, even 83 would be nice. For the moment all we want of him is that he trains. 50-71 at the end of the month!

Goals for June: Easy, there isn't much, so Brussels and the Tour de Suisse. Then a good start to the Tour. In Italy. Hm, Giro again? Ah no, post-Giro criterium!

[Robyklebt]

June

5th place in D1 with 11'247 points. 6 wins, plus 2 NC wins. Marquez 3 stages at the Tour de Suisse, second in GC and won the points jersey. GC no chance against Krausz once again, Krausz training to 88 made it rather easy for him to win. STaying at 87 would have been a nice fight I think, then there's a chance of dropping him once. Stupid settings for the prologue, put in risk high instead of 100% for the first few km, cost around 10" in the end irrelevant for GC I think. But helped getting stage wins, without that AAD possibly doesn't cooperate at all on some of the won stages. 3 of 5 possible stages finally, really the 4th should have come too, but too optimistic, with 100 form (suspect same for Krausz) thought I hope to gain 1" second more than just the sprint win. Other important win in June was Chassot winning the GP de Bruxelles, half the team form there, worked. Then 2 fantasy wins, Novelli and Fortuny opening their accounts. Plus Woldemariam defending his Eritrean title, Marquez taking over from Garcia in Colombia. Start of the TdF not much to report, was only 2 days.

Rider of the month: Marquez once again, but no interview, since he's busy in France.

Finance: +1'461'842. So close to my 1,5 million goal, good enough.

Training: Forgot...

Retirement: Lucien Trutat 01.12.22-18.06.24. 3396 points in 154 races, 3 wins, most important the Japan Cup 2023. Starting skills: 55-72-66-52-48, 71.1 pavé and 38 reg. Topskills: 76-78-66-50-48, 75,3 pavé. Due to his rather disappointing flat training he never was as good in pavé as we hoped he could become, on the other hand his mountain training was superb, certainly made up for that. With his sprint skill he wasn't a natural leader, still won 3 races, so more than his classics partner Lekubarri. Lucien now works for Airbus in Toulouse. He refused to tell us as what exactly, so we assume it's not as an engineer, more something like cleaner... but we don't know.

New rider
Émile Lachance from Amqui in Québéc, Canada. Starting skills: 73-50-78-51-43 with 53 reg. So a climber, one month later than usual, that was planned, not that we could have afforded a climber a month earlier even if we wanted. The goal is the usual, be ready for the Giro in May. And since he'll be only 33 in July 25, normally we expect him to ride the Tour as well. But for the first months of his career we really only expect him to train. His flat will always be a weakness, but we hope to bring it up to 55-56 at some point. His debut on the big stage shouldn't be the Vuelta, too young, so Andes or Dec tour.

Goals for July:
Tour. At least 2 stage wins and the GC are the goals. It's already the 9th of July, but unfortunately we have no info on how it's going so far. I suspect we probably have won 3-5 stages already, but as I said, I have no info.

[Robyklebt]

July

3rd place in D1 with 12'152 points. GC win at the Tour with Excelino Marquez, 5 stages. 2 each for Chassot and Marquez, one by Woldemariam. A fantasy race win for Lorenzini after the Tour. So of course an excellent month.
Tour was tight, lucky last TT, gaining 2" in the last km, so won the Tour by 2". Before that a seconds game vs Tarabesh, with Sullivan ahead, but seemed beatable. Funny enough, we only beat him when we didn't think we would anymore. The team we brought was good, Woldemariam in, Novelli out, made us expensive but gave us at 3 stages I guess. 1 with Woldemariam himself, 2 for Chassot. With his reg Haregot was very important in flat stages finally. In the mountain stages he was mostly behind other classics, number 3 in the team vs 2 in other teams. Plus the late form, that allowed him to be the only relevant classic in the climbers group on day 20, effect was minimal, but it clearly inspired Marquez to give his all in the final TT as well. Garcia as number 2 was out of GC pretty soon, at the start we were thinking about him for GC a bit too. Then good number 2, tempo, control, double attacks costing his followers energy too. Went quite well. Chassot with 2 wins good obviously, even if the sprints with CCs dominant sprint train were a bit annoying at times... Rest of the team performed well too, but the best, and rider of the season was obviously Marquez.

-Excelino, congrats to the Tour win!
-Thanks
-And rider of the month
-Thanks
-Finally the GC win in 24! You came close at Paris-Nice, there were hopes you could do it in the Tour de Suisse, now you win the Tour!
-Yes, I know
-And 22 wins! Same number as Lotfi Zafzaf! Amazing
-But I missed the Flèche Wallonne, I know I know
-Nobody cares anymore about that! Apologies if I was a bit harsh in the past!
-We all know you're an asshole anyway, so nobody cares much. But not winning the Flèche hurts regardless of your infantile interviews.
-Oh, come on, you won the Tour! Rider of the month! We don't need to fight!
-I'm not fighting, I'm answering questions.
-Ok, Tour de France win. You showed everybody that you're not just a stage hunter.
-I always was there for GC. Exception the Giro, where we all agreed from the start that just targeting stages made more sense than trying to go for the GC. It just never worked out for GC. At Paris-Nice I had all the luck in the world for stages, in the end 2" missing. So I was there. So failed the rehearsal, but this time nailed it. The same 2".
-And in a TT, which is were at the Tour de Suisse the trouble started.
-Yes, in Switzerland the team got our gearing completely wrong, so we all lost way too much time in the prologue. But ok, we benefited from that a bit later in the race, without my time loss in the prologue it would have been harder to win some of the stages, being closer to the race lead, might have resulted in a more passive riding style by Krausz' team. But yes, the Tour de Suisse was another race I was there, but just not enough. This time it worked. Actually my first TT at the Tour was very good too, gained 4" there.
-So you really won the Tour in the TT you think?
-No, that just was part of it. Bonifications even more decisive I guess. It was just the sum of little things, TT, bonifications, tiny advantage once or twice, and it was enough.
-6 GT stages, 9 cat 4 stages, you say you never were a stage hunter, but your numbers there are impressive.
-Yes, indeed. For stages often everything worked perfectly.
-So, the future...
-No future. I'm ready to retire, I'm just still officially part of the team because the Donkey doesn't want to lose my points this month.
-So no more races?
-Probably I'll ride San Sebastian. I'm still training a bit, still spend half my time at the team training center, so the condition still is ok. But San Sebastian should be my last race.
-So no Burgos, no Poland.
-No no, we're not riding either anyway as far as I know. And me definitely no, win the Tour to then possibly be beaten in a minor race?
-But the team desperately needs category 3 wins!
-Ask somebody else to get them.. wherever.
-So San Sebastian, then retirement, right
-Right.
-Good luck then for San Sebastian!

Finance:
+2'214'383 Excellent month

Training
Marquez keeping 88 mountain was huge, losing some TT not ideal, but worked out well. Koopman bad, Fortuny not as good as hoped, Novelli an asshole, but generally ok I guess.

Retirement
Leonardo Ceroni: Joined the team 01.01.23, left 21.07.24. Only left in July because we forgot to kick him out in June. Starting skills: 49-67-76-49-56 with 47 reg. Top skills: 60-80-78-49-55. 1319 points in 311 races. 1 win, a stage in the Vuelta 23. As a 60-80, despite his quite decent sprint skill, he was mostly a helper. Ceroni now will go work for RSI, although he was rejected as co-commentator for cycling races, lacking his fathers talent for the spoken word. But his connections (his father still) was enough to land him a job as a sound technician. We wish Ceroni a lot of success in his new career.

New rider

Franz Glück from Villach, Kärnten, Austria. For 1'345'431, the habitual 95%. His parents big fans of Franz Klammer, that's why he got the slightly out of fashion first name Franz. Starting skills: 48-73-48-55-53, 65,2 pavé, 42 reg. A flat rider, that's what he'll train mostly in his career. He's the guy who hopefully will take over from Stringfellow as top flat rider in a few seasons. Quite a few seasons. 50-86+ the goal. He could be an important part of the flat team already fairly soon, could turn out to be number 2 already in October.

Goals for August
San Sebastian, Plouay or whatever it's called nowadays. For the rest, no Vuelta, so.. ? Might go for Burgos after all? Goal in the sense of "score some points for Garcia" probably more than actual success. We'll see. August as often a bit of an off month regarding goals.

[Robyklebt]

August

4th in D1 wth 12'383 points. 2 wins, both Chassot during the Tour of Pologne, including the points jersey. We got the the mountain jersey for Almirall there too, so Pologne was a big success. The other Tour of the month much less, Woldemariam, we hoped for a bit more there in GC. finally 5th. Stage for Garcia didn't work either, no wonder vs an 88. Or 87? Big goal of the month San Sebastian, 9th Marquez 4" back, 13th Woldemariam at 12", Garcia in the same group 17". Classic group ahead with Marquez and Garcia, no chance to follow when they attack, so we rode quite a bit in the back, for Woldemariam.. who then was just 1" behind Bialetti, who ended up 2nd, 1" behind the winner. 1", second climbing km lost a lot, that was it. Other goal Bretagne, not that important, but if we're not in Spain, becomes the second most important race of the month, Bucquoy leader, sprint, looked good for at least a top 3, actually most likely first or second, we managed to tell Bucquoy to stop following his wheel, and he was dumb enough to listen. 4th, good chance lost. Feeling was we probably would have been second, but still, losing it like that, bah.

Rider of the month clearly André Chassot: Only winner of the month, so easy, but with 2 wins in a World Tour stage race, getting his 10th win, getting 5000 eternal points he's certainly a good rider of the season

-André, congratulations to your second rider of the season award
-André5000 please!
-André.... why?
-It's my official nickname now. Well it was my nickname before, but the Donkey refused to make it official until I reached these 5000 points.
-Okay, but now you want to be called André5000 only?
-Yes. I earned it. I proved that it was not only an aspirational nickname, I earned it. Not that I ever doubted that I had it to be what I am today.
-Which is rider of the month August!
-Not only that. I'm André5000! André 3000 was or is the best rapper ever,
-Eh, the Joggeli Rapper might disagree!
-The Joggeli Rapper? Seriously, the Joggeli Rapper? Come on. He's nothing. He's not even a drop in the ocean on a global scale, he simply doesn't exist as a rapper.
-That's harsh... it seems you don't really know rap... The Joggeli Rapper is widely known as one of the best, if not THE best swiss rapper.
-Yes, swiss rapper! That's the key word, swiss. Yeah, top 10 in Switzerland, I can see that. But that's nothing. Being one of the top 10 rappers in Switzerland is like being a top 10 volleyball player in Liechtenstein,
-Hey, stay nice, the FCC might take action if we stay things like that!!!
-Ok, it's like being one of the top 10 Jodler in Uganda, one of the top 10 Cricket players in Japan, one of the top 10 brains in Liechtenstein
-Leave the Liechtenstein examples be please, the FCC!
-Ok, make it Nauru... One of the top 10 Hornusser in Helgoland, one of the top 10 mountains in Denmark, one of
-We got the point, we got the point.
-I'm not trying to diss the Joggeli Rapper, as a sprinter he was damn good. A much better sprinter than rapper for sure, the best rapper that ever rode at c4f, sure, but that's about it with regards to his rapping. Joggeli Sprinter would have been a more appropriate name! Anyway, like André 3000 is the best rapper, I'm the best sprinter.
-Well.. 10 wins, there's quite a few sprinters in activity that have more than that.
-I value quality, like for rappers the quality of the song is more important than the quantity. I won Milano Sanremo, Brussels, 2 stages each of the Giro and the Tour. That already is enough to put me in the race for best sprinter. Add the 2 wins in Poland and I'm almost there And the 2 other races I got just make it a nice 10, and yes, you need two-digit numbers to be the number 1!
-Hm, isn't 1 single digit?
-Well, yes, ask some mathematician about that, find it weird too, if you need double digits to make a 1, how come it's 1 and not 01? Weird, eh?
-Definitely. We might be breaking mathematics here, all progress done in human history in that field gone in a single interview!
-Well mathematics, pff, who cares, worthless field, my parents married, 1+1, but now we're 5, actually 8 since my older brother married and got a son. 1+1=5, 5+1=8. Mathematics is like the Joggeli Rapper at rapping, even Austrians can be Mathematicians, that shows makes no actual sense!
-We're getting into FCC territory again!
-Damn, sensitive bunch it seems.
-But ok, we agreed that you are a 2 digit number 1 sprinter!
-THE 2 digit number 1 sprinter, there can only be one number 1.
-Could there be a 1 digit number 1?
-No, I think we established that to be number 1 you need 2 digits.
-True, as number 1 sprinter, what can we expect from you in September?
-We'll see, don't remember my program exactly actually, we forgot to use our notebook for September.
-Any career goals left?
-Well, I won what I needed to win, what was needed to be the number 1. Not just top 10 rapper in Switzerland, that's too easy, like being a top 10 mathematician in Austria,
-Ok, cut it, I want to finish this interview like 10 minutes ago, not go on and on about stuff that will land me in front of the FCC! That's the Donkey who goes there usually, not me, the awesome press secretary.
-Ok, have some fun man... Don't be so serious.
-Goals for September?
-Win something?
-October, Paris-Tours?
-Hm, I'm a realist, I have to say that a lot would need to go right for me to be able to win that, this gravel roads are not really my thing. But I assume we'll try. For me, or for somebody like Stringfellow, we'll see.
-Ok, André5000, I wish you a successful month! Oh, why no empty space after André? André 3000 has it after all.
-Ah, just looks better IMO, but you can write it both ways, not picky about that.
-Ok, thanks, have a good season!

Finances
+1'673'052, good month. Bad Burgos, outstanding Poland, then end of the month we underperformed a bit moneywise due to serial bad sprinting, but with Pologne it's still good.

Training
One training was excellent, so good all around I guess. Almirall, Uru 3/4 at 24, Chassot at 90, all good.

Retirement

Edwin Verkerk: 01.02.23-14.08.24 Starting skills: 55-64-53-48-56 with 35 reg. Topskills: 65-65-50-48-73. Hillsprinter. 222 races, 3306 eternal points. 2 wins, got 2 wins, ok career, but it was a great career, the 2 wins were a TdF stage in 2023, Rrurrambu doing the leadout for him, and Frankfurt, cat 4 as well. So great career. Times with ultra small groups are over, so with his skills unrealistic to expect 5+ wins, winning the 2 he won.. fantastic. Edwin now works in a bar in Amsterdam.

Excelino Marquez: 03.06.23-01.09.24 Starting skills: 73-52-78-50-53 and 52 reg. 54.1 pavé Topskills: 88-58-78-50-53. 124 races, 16'823 eternal points, number 4 of active riders, number 4 in the history of the team and number 111 of retired riders. All at the time of retirement. 135,7 points per race. 22 wins, 2 stage races. 22 wins puts him in 3rd place in the history of the team, together with Lotfi Zafzaf.
El Magnifico opened his account with the youth jersey at the Vuelta 23, his first win came in November, the winter classic Villalba GP. And then dominated a weak climbers field in Southern India during the December tour, 4 stages and the GC, plus the mountain jersey. A stage win in Bessèges, then Paris-Nice, 5 stages, but second place in GC, beaten by 2". But go the points jersey. Next, the Flèche Wallonne, and the defeat that hurt the most, second place behind Flopp McNell. Who ended his career with 16'845 eternal points, 22 more than El Magnifico. But Marquez kept fighting, a stage in Romandie, 4 stages during the Giro, with second place in GC while stage hunting, 3 stages at the TdS, second place in GC again, there we had hoped to fight for the win, but Krausz training up to 88 mountain too put an end to that dream. Last stage race, the Tour, and he won that, 2", gained on the last km of the final TT! The 2" missing in Nice in March were found there in July.
So 22 wins, a lot of them thanks to his pretty decent sprint, 53.
5 Paris-Nice
1 Romandie
4 Giro
3 Tour de Suisse
2 Tour de France
15 high quality stage wins in cat 4+ stage races, not even Zafzaf had that!
His weakness finally were the 1 day races, only won 1, his first Pro win, Villalba GP

2 GC wins, 2 points jersey (PN and TdS), 1 mountain jersey (Nadu&Kerala International Bicycle Race) and 1 youth jersey (Vuelta).
A great career with lots of wins. Despite el Magnifico still feeling well, the team and he were in agreement that he wasn't going to try for the Vuelta, after winning the Tour the fire was out, so after staying with the team in August, he has now retired. He's back in Riohacha where he will manage his bicycle shop full time now, and in addition help the city with the digitalization of their archives.

New rider
Alex Dixon from Cockfield in Durham, England. His skills: 73-54-70-48-43 and 43 reg. 55.2 pavé. A climber, the second climber for the 25 season. Different type from El Magnifico, he won't be able to rely on his sprint skill to win stages, he will have to arrive alone. Same as Lachance, who has 43 sprint as well. Not too much regeneration won't prevent Dixon to try to ride for GC, when the opportunity presents itself. For the moment all he has to do is train, mountain and flat, as high as possible. He might ride his first races in October, but we only expect results from November on, possibly the Andes, possibly the Dectour.

Goals for September

Open the calendar, filter by category!

[Robyklebt]

September

Timely as usual, September is over!
15th in D1, 7562 points, relegation to D2. 1 win, Bucquoy with his first win, Mateotti. The bigger races:
Cyclassics: 5. Chassot, pretty boring race if I remember correctly
Fourmies: Group goes through, Chassot 9th wins in the peloton, seems I had to ride alone all day there, don't really remember
Québéc: 11. Bucquoy, the usual borefest there. Don't dislike the race, but it usually turns out to be a bit boring
Montréal: 2. Garcia, won the sprint of the group that just didn't catch a late attacker when the group was looking at each other. 1 km more tempo with Haregot and... but actually was ok, Garcia with his flat despite 100 form wasn't sure to follow, rather have him being able to follow too. Then on the wrong guy, Garcia on the right one follows and wins the sprint.

Garcia also second in Sabatini, Bucquoy third Pantani, won Matteotti as mentioned. Just Toscana nothing, 18th with Bucquoy, but why go for a classic leader with no chance of winning, rather try and fail with Bucquoy.
Then rode Luxembourg, an attempt to earn points to stay up, hopeless, but 2nd in GC for Woldemariam finally, a bit lucky, thanks to climbers riding weird too, but we'll take it.

Rider of the season: Ceriel Bucquoy with his first win, the only win, so clearly he gets the most prestigious award of c4f for September.
No interview, Ceriel just rode a race and he seemed rather angry at some perceived lateness of this award.

Finances
+1'160'216. So 350'000 under our usual goal, forgot why exactly.

Training
Who remembers... I do! Actually I do. Good Uru, 3/4? Good Lachance 3/4, here sure. Both mountain. So 73 classic at 25, 84
climber at 23, excellent.

Retirement
Marquez on 01.09., but we already mentioned him in the August post. But a great rider, so deserved another mention now.
And
-Callum Blake: 01.03.23-26.09.24 Pavé rider. Starting skills: 49-66-58-57-45 with 70.8 pavé, 82 internal pavé skill, 47 reg Top skills: 50-79-56-56-49 and 79.9 pavé 13 flat trainings only, clearly disappointing. He was bought 1 month too early, debut in early March, not April, so 35 for his main goal, so we bought another pavé rider one month later, Magritte, maybe that demotivated him. But starting at 66, nothing else to cover, +13 really isn't enough. Planned as pavé leader in the end from a certain age on he became a cheap helper to be used in as many races as possible, as that he was useful. Otherwise not really. 325 eternal points in 211 races, that's the 5th least points a rider (that finished his career with us) got in the history of the team. A 4th place in a fantasy race at age 22 remained his best placement. 14th in Het Nieuwsblad 24 his most worthy result. 42 and 27 in Roubaix, supposedly his race, just show how disappointing his career as pavé specialist was. After retirement Callum originally wanted to take up poetry and maybe some painting, but due to the fact that he didn't earn as much money as he hoped for during his career, he had to take up a real job. Works as a realtor in Crawley, midway between London and Brighton.

New rider

Wakara Ganambarr joined the team on 04.09.24 for 1'710'171. From Australia, Elcho Island. Part of our DS contract with Gurruwiwi, we are required to hire one of the young riders from Rrurrambu's sport development center. Ganambarr was worth it, starting skills 49-69-72-53-65 with 47 reg and 71.4 pavé, so 77 internal pavé skill. Together with Fortuny leader for Flanders and Roubaix. With 65 sprint, he has good chances to finish high up in a sprint finish, with 72 downhill he won't be at at disadvantage in downhills in Flanders, something that has been a weakness of many of his predecessors. Of course he needs to improve in the mountains and flat first. In both as much as possible. Flat at least 82 unless he wants to train worse than Blake... Mountain ideally close to 60, 58 would probably be kind of ok. No pressure for results in the first months, but lots of pressure to train. He has only 7 months to prepare for Flanders and Roubaix, so no lazy months allowed, Up to 80 before the end of November!

[Robyklebt]

November just started in our time zone, so of course we have to review October

October

2nd place in D2, 7420 points. 2 wins in 31 races. The big goals, Lombardia, Paris-Tours missed, but at least Gran Piemonte, for Bucquoy. And Chassot with his 11th career win in Binche.

Rider of the season, Ceriel Bucquoy again. This time we have time for an interview:

-Ceriel, second time rider of the season. Congratulations! How do you feel.
-Nice, but I would really appreciate it if you could announce it a bit earlier. It almost feels personal now, that when I get the award it's announced so late. And I think my performance suffers a bit from the uncertainty.
-We want to have mentally strong riders in our team! If the wait for the announcement of the award upsets you, maybe you're in the wrong team? I might have to recommend to the boss to get rid of you.
-It's the most imporant award of cycling. Everybody that has a chance to win it is upset at the wait. Why do you think Chassot isn't winning at a higher rate? Why do you think Lachance is struggling in training? It's this mismanagement, the uncertainty.
-Lachance never was in the running for the award, why would it bother him?
-Do you have to be so direct? This again is not helpful for the team performance. And despite this we are still delivering. I won Piemonte without knowing I won the award in September.
-Ok ok, but I'll still talk to Big Donkey about you and Lachance, if you are really right for this team.
-Your job is to do sensible interviews, maybe I have to talk to the Donkey about you as well.
-Ok, let's just not talk with the boss maybe, what do you think?
-How is that a sensible question in a serious interview?
-Ok, how do you feel?
-A bit tired, we just rode a race, Dolisie-Pointe Noire!
-No, impossible, that's late in November, we just started that. Plus it's called Dolisie Point Noire.
-Ah vas te faire foutre, connard. I'm a native french speaker, I know if the place is called Point or Pointe. And stop taking whatever pills your taking.
-Well, my doctor said I better take those, cholesterol and stuff, you know?
-The other ones...
-No other ones. But dammit, I meant how do you feel about winning the award.
-Angry. At the late announcement. Why not tell me that weeks ago? But of course proud. Winning the award once is amazing, winning it twice is amazing!
-You're not really a wordsmith, are you?
-I'm an award-winning hill sprinter, what are you? Any awards?
-The Donkey gave me half of the carrot he got from FL
-Ok, that is fairly impressive.
-But back to you, 2 wins, 2 awards, a bit of a minimalistic approach to awards, no?
-Well yes, but that's what we sprinters do. We try to win with the minimum effort required. What good does it do if we dominate all the intermediates but then are out of energy at the end? Same for the greatest award in Cycling, better to make your mark with one big win, then win 5 races nobody cares about.
-Matteotti is not all that.
-It is, it is all that. It's Matteotti.
-After your failure in Hamburg, did you still believe in your ability to win a big race?
-Well, Hamburg clearly was unfortunate, the DS in my ear, the gear change jammed, happens, but we talked about it and it's all ok. The team still has confidence in me. And I showed that I can win big races.
-You've shown an aptitude for Italian races. How come?
-Maybe some influence of my father? As an anarchist, many of his idols are Italian anarchists, so he tought me Italian from a young age, maybe that's it? Or maybe I just feel well on Italian roads, the style of riding fits me.
-So the logical next big win is Milano-Sanremo. Is that a goal?
-Of course. That's my big career goal. While others will suffer on the Cipressa and the Poggio, I should have no problems there. It's a race that fits me well, and of couse I plan to win it.
-But Chassot won it, and he's not knowns as a great climber.
-It always depends on how the race is ridden. Due to the widespread chicken-flu at c4f at the moment, a team like ours certainly can change the outcome of a race, can change how it is ridden. We want to make it hard, we will. The teams afflicted by chicken-flu won't do much to oppose us. I'm confindent to win in Sanremo.
-And until then, any goals?
-Now that I finally know that I indeed go the award, I can fully concentrate on winning again. So yes, whatever is left in November, I want it, whatever is left raced in December, I want it. After all we sprinters need to win the award again, right now it's 5-5 vs the climbers, we want to show we're more important to the team than the climbers. To get better support.
-You're unhappy with the support you get? There's countless races we've seen Almirall ride and ride...
-Well, and not getting the sprint. We're not blaming Almirall or Stringfellow, or even me, bu
-What about Novelli?
-That fucker, yeah, we blame that asshole, he's better at riding for himself than for the team. And his training is abmysal too, no effort, no class, no positive character trait.. but I was saying, we're not blaming the helpers we have, or the guys for a train we have. It's just a fact that I'm not a good enough leadout for Chassot, I'm good at other things. Same for Almirall, he's just not good enough to do 30km on his own. He needs more support to do his job.
-Ok, do you have any specific goals for November?
-Wait, what's left..
-All, all is left!
-No it isn't. Let me see... every race that I have a chance and of the more difficult ones Wallis et Futuna I guess, either me or Chassot, we'll see.
-Ok then good luck and hope to see you again here in a month!
-Less than a month I hope, not a month, less, much less!

Finances
+1'527'159, so our 1,5 millions goal reached

Training
Lachance 0/4 mountain at 24, not too good. The rest we don't remember

Retirement
-Matisse Magritte 01.04.23-31.10.24 Starting skills 54-69-48-54-47, with 72.9 pavé. top skills: 60-85-48-51-47 with 84.1 pavé. 1602 points, 1 win in 169 races. Good flat training, but in the end wasn't enough to reach his big goals. His gravel/pavé spring was ok, but the big win missing, 2 Jaen, 5 Het Nieuwsblad 9 Strade Biance, 6 Denain, 5 DVV, 9 Flanders. And finally 11 in Roubaix. Generally inept opponents, chicken flu afflicted RfM, doubtful selectivity of the probably very dry cobblestones that day assured that a big group (20 riders) would sprint for the win, with his sprint skill that clearly wasn't ideal for him.
His only win came in a Belgian Waffle race in October 23. Better than nothing. Matisse has taken a month off now, his travelling the world (not by bike), and plans to open a live house together with René Henri in early December. They plan to play with their band their too, surprisingly they are good musicians, even if we always assumed that painting was their hobby. We even let them repaint our team bus, we regretted that for 20 minutes, after that we simply decided to ask professinals to redo it. But guitars? Those 2 are your guys! Anyway, we wish him best of luck in his new endeavour.

New rider
Marco Lanfredini from Firenze joined the team on 01.11.24. Starting skills: 51-73-78-52-46 with 48 reg. A 60-80. As usual for the moment all we expect from him is training. And we hope to have him with more flat than our current 60-80es, so 85+ ideally. 60-85 would be fine, but we'll see how it goes. With his sprint wins don't seem all that easy to get for him, but his main job will be to help anyway. Bucquoy for a while, then climbers and classics.

Goals for November
No Andes, so 1 day classics. Although I heard that we might somewhat regret not riding the Andes... but on the other hand another 6 team race, and of course my protest against pavé in the Andes, so no, no Andes. And no other stage race either planned. Cat 2+3 the goal obviously.

Not only October is over, but also the real season:

Stage races:
Paris Nice: 2. E. Marquez 1 1. H. Woldemariam. 5 stages, 5x E. Marquez, points jersey E. Marquez
Volta a Catalunya 2. M. Garcia 4. E. Marquez, 3 stages, 3x M. Garcia, mountain jersey M. Garcia
Tour de Romandie: 5. E. Marquez, 1 stage, E. Marquez
Giro d'Italia 2. E. Marquez, 12. H. Woldemariam, 6 stages, 4x E. Marquez 2. A. Chassot
Tour de Suisse: 2. E. Marquez, 11. M. Garcia, 3 stages, E. Marquez, points jersey, E. Marquez
Tour de France 1. E. Marquez, 6. M. Garcia, 18. H. Woldemariam 5 stages, 2x E. Marquez, 2x A. Chassot 1x H. Woldemariam

So finally we got our stage race win of the year, in the Tour nonetheless. Very satisfied with our stage race results. Yes, we thought our best chance for a GC win was in Nice, where we missed it by 2". Once again, while we manage to win Tirreno from time to time, actually good win ration, 4 out of 7, so 57,1428%, Paris-Nice somehow always slips through our fingers. 1 win in 12 participations, now 5 second places, second time we lose by almost nothing. But in the end we did win in Nice, just the other finish we had there, by 2" again. We prefer it this way, sorry Tarabesh.
Giro, second without really trying, we were going for stages, never tried for the GC win, seemed hopeless, we rather wanted stages, the second place was just sort of an automatic plus then.
What made this stage race season very good was the huge amount (for us) of stage wins. 5 for Marquez in Paris-Nice, 1 Romandie, 4 Giro, 3 TdS. Where we missed the 4th on the day we had 100% form, same as our opponents, because we wanted to try to come back in GC, wasn't realistic anyway, just hang and win.. And then 2 more in the Tour. 6 GT stage wins, 9 in the 4 smaller stage races he rode. Outstanding. Garcia added 3 in Catalunya (where we are used to dominate, 5 GCs and 22 stages in 9 participations, but haven't won it 2 years in a row now) Chassot 2 each in the Giro and Tour, and Haregot won one in the Tour. 11 GT stages, 12 in the cat 4 tours.

Classics:

Milano-Sanremo: 1. A. Chassot 7. R. Lorenzini 14. E. Verkerk
Ronde van Vlaanderen: 4. I. Vanuytsel 9. M. Magritte
Paris-Roubaix: 11. M. Magritte 18. R. Henri
Liège-Bastogne-Liège: 5. E. Marquez, 12. H. Woldemariam
Il Lombardia: 8. M. Garcia 17. H. Woldemariam

It started well, Chassot winning Sanremo, Big Donkey with the full train in Via Roma, weird opponents, yeah. Shouldn't have read my report again, now I'm pissed off at the passivity of those chicken-flu guys again. But who cares, I won. And with that the classic season is already a very good one.
Ronde escape with Isidoor, mistake, should send Blake, he could have won it, old Isidoor last in his group. As was Magritte, last in the favorites group. Group through, chicken flu again.
Roubaix again some chicken flu going around, plus the dry pavé that weren't selective at all. One good attack with Henri, but stronger sprinters there, and they wait for a guy a few seconds back. Who doesn't even have good flat.
Liège no memory, neither Lombardia, no intention to check either.

Other cat 5 and 4 races:
Bruxelles won, Chassot, great, CC was unhappy, even greater, he wanted it too!
Gran Piemonte with Bucquoy, great again!
Flèche Wallonne: Beaten by Flopp! 2nd and 3rd for Marquez and Garcia, horrible. But nothing to say, Flopp just was good.

All in all would have liked to win 1 or 2 more of course, but having Sanremo makes it a very good classic season already. Like this not a great one, but still a very good one.


Outlook for the real season 25:
Flandern races: With Ganambarr potentially we have our best chance since ages. If he trains. 65 sprint, downhill, mid-high 50es mountain, hopefully 80 or very close to 80 pavé (very close as slightly under, if we're over I don't mind if we're far) 65 sprint the key. But no guarantee. And of course he's just 22 right now, we'll see how he trains.
Sanremo: Bucquoy, but unlike him we're not too confident. Yes, chicken-flu, he's right about that, very widespread at the moment. And we fear will be for some time. If not forever. But despite our last minute buy Lanfredini we fear we simply won't have the team for Bucquoy. Lanfredini more last second than last-minute finally, With perfect training 85 end of January.. .which means that he will more likely be at 82/83 then. And maybe 85 end of February, if all goes reasonably well. But that means that his mountain skills won't be up there yet. But we'll see.
Roubaix: Again Ganambarr, but also Fortuny here. In the Flandern races Ganambarr is clearly the leader, in Roubaix depending on training Fortuny could start as co-leader, or even outright leader. But still needs to train for that, and unlike Ganambarr he's not that young. 28, 83 flat, we hope he gets lucky and end up at 85+, but....
Liège: Uru? Well, yeah, the sprint... otherwise he looks good, a bit weak in flat, but 74 at 27 is quite good, up to 75 wouldn't be a sensation.

Spring stage races till the Giro: Here doesn't look good at all compared to 24. 2 climbers with sprint, we won shitloads of stages. Our 2 current or future heroes have.... 43, both of them. Risky prediction; We'll win far fewer stages than in 24. GC, we'll try, despite and even stronger leader by AAD this year we plan to try for the Giro GC too, although not really clear how yet. But after all our climbers are not done with their training yet, so let's wait and see and do strategies a bit later.
After that the Tour and the Vuelta. By delaying our first climber by a season, they will be 33 and 31 in July, and then we plan to send them to the Vuelta with 34-32 (35-33 at the end). With Lachance possibly omitted in favor of the Giro climber for 26, who should come for June this year again, so be 23-24 at the time. Depending on Lachance fitness then

Sprint: No top sprinter, well yes, Toulet, but top because he's top, not necessarily his skills. Being top after all is a requirement to join Big Donkey, unlike other teams we have high standards. Other people would maybe call him a flat strong money sprinter, 80-80 flat and sprint is the optimistic goal, especially the sprint part at 80 seems far right now, but we'll see. No direct successor for Chassot, a hill sprinter maybe later.

Damn, we started writing this as soon as November started, now 22 days nonstop writing, reviewing, thinking, re-reviewing, rewriting and we're finally done! (Unfortunately no time for proof reading)

[Robyklebt]

Still no November review, will do that in January together with December.

Today just breaking news:
Camille Roy (Fr) joined the team today for 1'763'227, which is 74%. He's been there a few days, hoped he gets cheaper, but of course have no clue about cheapened riders, usually don't buy them.
Skills: 64-84-69-47-44 with 61 reg. 74.4 pavé
After a 66 race career with 1 win and 343 career points at Fdgames, after 17 days on the transfer market he decided to join Big Donkey.
27 years old, he will be Bucquoy's top helper in the spring, and one of 2 60-80 for the Giro. Possibly the Tour. With his reg he wants a decent salary, but we feel he will be worth it.