Gipfelstuermer - The road will decide

[Gipfelstuermer]

Why Petit Singe and Big Donkey are counted as two teams, just so that RKL isn't on top?

Is Astana the same team as US Postal Service?
Is Bora Hansgrohe the same team as NetApp?
Is UAE Team the same team as Lampre?

Not so easy to decide.

So no. No problem with RKL / Petit Singe / Big Donkey. But I am not responsible for name changes or have a database to track that for every team. So if I can't track it or do it for everyone, would be unfair to track it for some selected guys, like Dickson / cataracs / Taka

[Gipfelstuermer]

The year 2020

FACTS
Races: 289
Race wins: 63
Points: 48,256

C4F WORLD TOUR
Race Wins: 14 (2019: 28)
Ranking by Race Wins: #14 (2019: #9)
Points: 3,965 (2019: 3,420)
Ranking by Points: #15 (2019: #20)
Best Rider: Jacob JJ Jefferson (#7 with 10 wins / #11 with 2,160 points)

IMPORTANT RACES
We rode all the Grand Tours and most of the World Tour races. The team collected 8 Grand Tours stage wins (2x Giro, 4x TDF, 2x Vuelta) thanks to 3 riders (4x JJ, 2x Boulanger, 2x Brandt). Even more importantly, JJ became the first rider to defend maglia ciclamino and maillot vert. With his win at Driedaagse Brugge–De Panne, JJ is also responsible for our only one classic race win this year. Besides that, the classics and monuments were a bit disappointing, even if we had a podium for JJ at MSR, podium for Thornquist at RVV and podium for Einarsson at PR.

RIDER OF THE YEAR
No doubt. Jacob JJ Jefferson. Again. If you haven't, read the documentary about JJ here.

2020 - Jacob JJ JEFFERSON
2019 - Jacob JJ JEFFERSON
2018 - Fabio FONDA
2017 - Oscar OLIVEIRA
2016 - No Racing
2015 - No Racing
2014 - No Racing
2013 - No Racing
2012 - Karim KHAIR
2011 - Jose JANUARIO
2010 - No Racing
2009 - Carloe TEVEZ

Team Outlook 2021
So the idea was to go into the Grand Tours with two mountain riders. Kristian Kapusta and Willem DeWit. Kapusta trained so horribly (stuck at 79 moutain!), that we had to sell him already. DeWit doing a bit better. 82 mountain at 23 years is not ideal, but he can reach 85 or maybe even more, if we are lucky. However, with Kapusta being one of the worst transfers of the Gipfelstuermer history, ambitions are a bit low for 2021. Can DeWit reach something at Giro or Vuelta? (TDF too much TT for him) Can we afford to sign another climber? Even if we can, isn't it too late for 2021?

Then for the monuments. We were supposed to focus on the Grand Tours again, but we have some underdog chances for the monuments: Boulanger a candidate for MSR? Brandt a candidate for RVV & LBL? Majerus a candidate for PR? DeWit a candidate for LBL & Lombardia? In any case, the team can't wait for real races to begin. Tired of only trying to collect money during off-season. Looking forward to the real races!

[Gipfelstuermer]

January 2021: Making money and waiting for the season to start!

Result:
Races: 29
Race wins: 6
Points this month: 3,039
"Season" points: 5,786
Result: [#13] in Div1

Important races:
After TDU and Cadel Evans had been cancelled pre-season (in real life and RSF) and San Juan and Mallorca challenge had also been cancelled (only in real life), it was another pure fantasy race month. Anyway, we are quite happy with 3 stage wins during MIT (by Zevenbergen, VanDerVeen & Cooper) and 2 stage wins during San Juan (by VanDerVeen & Brandt). Hopefully February will have some real races, which do no get cancelled!

Rider of the month:
Dries VAN DER VEEN was the strongest guy this month. A stage win at MIT, a stage win at San Juan! Well done, Dries!

Training:
With the new non-flash version came a training bug! DeWit trained 2x mountain! So 84 mountain at 24 years now, which is quite good for him. Can he become a real Grand Tours leader? Should we buy a second climber for this season? ... What about the other team members? Majerus and Zevenbergen continue to disappoint. Poudrier and Varga are developing into good, cheap helpers. After Cooper's win on the pavé MIT stage, I hope he can keep his 86 Flat for a while, but he will probably be too old for Paris Roubaix with 38 years then...

Finances:
+1,713,903 thanks to riding MIT and San Juan in reasonably small groups (12 teams and 7 teams) with reasonably cheap teams. Good result, so we were able to buy 2 new riders for next month and still have enough in the bank for future transfers!

Retired Riders:
Boas BERGSTEINSSON retires after 360 races for the team! That makes him #3 of all Gipfelstuermers in terms of number of races! While he was mainly a domestique, he still won 6 races, including 2x National Champion of Iceland! He could have stayed with the team for another year, but as we signed two young talents for the next month, he is allowed to retire at 38 years old. Þakka þér fyrir, Boas!
Starting Values: 54-73-67-52-55-67.9, 55reg
Best Values: 60-86-67-52-55-77.0, 55reg
Ending Values: 50-77-54-38-47-70.7, 55reg

New Riders:
Thijs VAN 'T WOUT 48-74-78-55-51-76.4, 45reg - His dream was to ride L'Enfer du Nord one day... and he will get the possibility to ride it twice! In 2021 and 2022!
Gaspard GAGNEUX 52-67-71-50-54-70.9, 55reg - Not as much a pavé specialist as Thijs, but still Gaspard can be a nice guy for the 2021 and 2022 classic season. A little bit more mountain should help him focus on slightly more Hilly classics. His Reg will also make him a nice helper during tours.

Statistic of the month: Longest streaks of Div1-wins!
After Hansa has now broken the legendary streak of 4 months by Lorient, it is time to compare the longest streaks of Div1 wins in history.
6 months - Pokemonogatari (Mar 2018 - July 2018)
5 months - EQUIPE LEGENDE (June 2011 - Nov 2011)
5 months - The worsd one (Apr 2015 - Aug 2015)
5 months - Pokemonogatari (Jan 2017 - June 2017)
5 months - RS Coesitz (Dec 2018 - Apr 2019)
4 months - Alkworld (July 2012 - Okt 2012)
4 months - Alkworld (Nov 2015 - Feb 2016)
4 months - Lorient (Oct 2019 - Jan 2020)
4 months - Lorient (Sep 2020 - Dez 2020)

Goals for February 2020:
Always the question: Ride UAE or Omloop? UAE potentially gives more points for the C4F World Tour, as you can get points for stages, not only for final result. UAE should also give more money..... But Omloop has much higher prestige, is much more desirable. Difficult to decide.

[Bear]

Omloop, for sure!! One of the best races.

Nice transfers. Especially Thijs VAN 'T WOUT. Did not see him on the market. That could have been a nice rider for my team as well. How much did you pay? You train flat/sprint or flat/mtn?

[Gipfelstuermer]

Nice transfers. Especially Thijs VAN 'T WOUT. Did not see him on the market. That could have been a nice rider for my team as well. How much did you pay? You train flat/sprint or flat/mtn?

I was the only one bidding and paid ~96%, so 2.3 million (value 2.38 million).

Training is a good question.. mountain/sprint he both lacks... thinking about Roubaix, sprint would be more important... for many other races a bit of mountain can be helpful, too...

[Bear]

Not cheap, but ok for a captain. Yes, starting with flat/sprint is probably the best option. You can train mtn later when he already reached 88 flat and 57 sprint

[Gipfelstuermer]

February 2021: Let the season begin!

Result:
Races: 28
Race wins: 5
Points this month: 2,792
"Season" points: 5,819
Result: [#9] in Div1

Important races:
Finally real races! That's the most important thing! Besseges, Provence, Haut Var and then the start of Spring classic with Omloop and KBK! Of all these race, of course Omloop the most important one. Brandt created a lot of action there as he tried to go together with Lanz from Big Donkey after the Muur and Bosberg but it was not enough. They were caught 2km before the finish line in Ninove. The team also created some action at KBK, but again (as in Omloop) Jacob Wolfowitz from AAD stole the win.

Rider of the month:
Willem DE WIT after winning stage 3 of Tour de la Provence on Mont Ventoux and winning the GC vs. pre-race favorite Apicella from Big Donkey.

Training:
DeWit even trained mountain up from 84 to 85. Other than that, pretty much average/bad training. Let's hope that Cooper keeps his pavé until Roubaix and/or Van 'T Wout continues his training until Roubaix. Mmmh, Roubaix? We have MSR and RVV before that! For MSR, some danger that Bastien downtrains but with 34-years should not be too much normallz. For RVV, Brandt will have the perfect age of 32-years. Some surprise flat training would be good for, so please, C4F god, make it happen!

Finances:
+1,628,132 is a good financial result. If we continue like that, this should enable us to buy 2-3 new riders soon, so that the team grows. 2-3 new riders in the next 3 months, but nobody retiring... would make it a team of 14-15 riders. Nice!

Retired Riders:
-

EDIT: New rider added on 3 March
New Riders:
Bonifacio BALLABENI, 72-55-73-57-49-54.4, 46reg, a cousin of famous Giorgio Ballabeni, who moved from Italy to Munich to found the best gelateria in the whole world. While Bonifacio loves ice-cream, his father only allows him the low-sugar organic version which is approved for a cyclist's training! Let's hope he trains well!

Statistic of the month: MOST MONUMENT WINS by Teams!
We already had most monument wins by riders. But this time let's look at teams. Especially now, at the start of the real season, it is time to study monuments. Many teams with 3,4 or 5 wins while I have 0... puh... time to change that! But let's only look at those teams with >5 wins.
17 - Alkworld (2x MSR, 4x RVV, 2x PR, 4x LBL, 5x Lombardia)
10 - Lorient (2x RVV, 2x PR, 3x LBL, 3x Lombardia)
8 - Los Ticos (2x MSR, 1x PR, 2x LBL, 2x Lombardia)
8 - Team FL (1x MSR, 2x RVV, 3x PR, 1x LBL, 1x Lombardia)
7 - Petit Singe (2x MSR, 1x RVV, 3x PR, 1x Lombardia)
7 - Pokemonogatari (2x MSR, 1x RVV, 2x LBL, 2x Lombardia)
6 - RV Allagen (2x MSR, 1x RVV, 2x LBL, 1x Lombardia)
6 - SM Team (1x MSR, 1x RVV, 2x PR, 1x LBL, 1x Lombardia)
6 - r Sukuran Pokemon (1x MSR, 2x PR 2x LBL, 1x Lombardia)

Goals for March 2021:
We are doing the Italian programme because travelling is difficult these days. The programme starts with Strade Bianche, then Tirreno and then MSR. Strade Bianche maybe the race I love the most. Will never forget Trevorvano THOMPSON winning in Siena in 2019. Last year 2nd place for Edvin EINARSSON. And this year I wanted to see the race in person in Tuscany, but not possible due to covid.... And with MSR in the same month... difficult to set form for both. So the big goal is winning MSR of course. Bastien our leader. Can he do it vs. guys like Lim, Messerli and Celestino? Or do we need a backup plan?

[Gipfelstuermer]

March 2021: Not relegated! Wohoo!

Result:
Races: 31
Race wins: 4
Points this month: 3,884
"Season" points: 5,607
World Tour points: 60
Result: #19 in Div1

Important races:
Bartholomäus Brandt with a nice stage win on stage 2 of Tirreno - Adriatico. His win in Chiusdino was remarkable in a strong peloton including Big Donkey and CircleCycle who dominated in March during Strade Bianche and Tirreno... Other than that a very meager March... luckily not relegated despite bad results!

Rider of the month:
Bartholomäus BRANDT for the second time in his career, thanks to the stage win at Tirreno. This was also our first World Tour race win of the year.

Training:
Average training month kind of... basically forgot all of it by now... ah no, not average, actually shitty. Remeber the new climber Bonifacio BALLABENI skipped his first mountain training at 99%... bravo, Bonifacio! But ok, we explained him again and then he took the other 3 trainings. Keep going, my friend! You'll be a legend one day! Maybe the strongest mountain rider ever, who did not train on first training!

Finances:
+1,237,147 quite okay for the start of the season and without any really good results that could have given us a lot of money.

Retired Riders:
Bastien BOULANGER says bye bye after 276 races, 6 race wins and 6,801 points for our team. His most impressive race win was in Nice at stage 3 of Le Tour 2020, where he was the lead-out for JJ, but JJ just could not get around him. In most other races, JJ was able to come around and so we thank Bastien for being one of the best lead-out riders during JJ's career. Without him, the 2nd maglia ciclamino and the 2nd maillot vert of JJ would not have been possible.

New Riders:
Severin SAVOIE, 56-71-77-51-58-65.4, 43reg, coming right out of our young talent scounting in Luxembourg. The third talent from Luxembourg after Majerus and Gagneux. Hopefully he turns into a strong classic rider before Brandt and Zevenbergen retire.

Statistic of the month: Most Liege-Bastogne-Liege Wins by Teams

I wanted to do most MSR wins... but then this month report got delayed and delayed and delayed... and I prefer to have a statistic about an upcoming race. Just as it creates some "Vorfreude". So ahead of L-B-L on 25 April, here is Most Liege-Bastogne-Liege Wins by Teams. And surprisingly, Alkworld not the lone leader! Skullz same level as him!

4 - Skullz (2008, 2009, 2011, 2012)
4 - Alkworld (2013, 2015, 2016, 2019)
3 - Lorient (2018, 2019, 2020)
2 - Los Ticos (2009, 2010)
2 - Team lulu (2010, 2011)
2 - RP KMT (2010, 2013)
2 - RV Allagen (2012, 2014)
2 - r Sukuran Pokemon (2014, 2017)
2 - Liquigas-CND (2018, 2020)
2 - Pokemonogatari (2018, 2020)

Goals for April 2021:
Try to win a monument! As easy as that!

[Gipfelstuermer]

April 2021: No classic wins, only podiums, that hurts

Result:
Races: 28
Race wins: 2
Points this month: 6,165
"Season" points: 8,693
World Tour points: 1,245
Result: #18 in Div1 (wohoo, another season in Div1!)

Important races:
Bartholomäus Brandt 2nd @RVV, Thijs Van 'T Wout 3rd @Brabant, Joost Zevenbergen 2nd @Amstel... not really what we were hoping for, but classics are hard. We'll have to live with it. Instead, Willem DeWit showed a great Giro preparation race at Pais Vasco, winning the last stage and finishing as 3rd on the podium. Joost Zevenbergen with a nice stage win at Romandie, too.

Rider of the month:
Willem DE WIT as his performance at Pais Vasco (stage + podium) was clearly stronger than anything we did at the classic races.

Training:
Ballabeni up to 79 mountain (4/4) as we had him here for 100% mountain training. Savoie with 4/4 double training. Van 'T Wout up to 85 flat (3/4 trainings) is quite good, too. Let's hope our youngstars continue.

Finances:
+1,126,063, most of it earned at Pais Vasco. One-day races and classics.... too expensive, but not enough success.

Retired Riders:
Chris COOPER retires although his values (51-81-55) would be O.K. for a 39-year old! But the cobbled classics are over, it wasn't enough for a big win in his career. We thank you for 307 races (2 wins). Only 7 other Gipfelstuermer riders achieved took part in more races.

Vic VANDENBROUCKE retires as well, because we don't really plan with him for the Giro or Le Tour, which he'd have to ride with 36 and 38 years, respectively. 283 races and 1 race win for him. But he was a great flat-/sprint-helper for many sprints, launching our sprinters and therefore, he even had a small part in JJ's big career. Merci, Vic.

Most Races (Total 1,405 | Riders with >300 races)

383 - Matti MYYRY
371 - Kaapo KEMPPAINEN
360 - Boas BERGSTEINSSON
342 - Jacob JJ JEFFERSON
331 - Jairo JIMENEZ
325 - Magnus MARTINSEN
310 - Halvard HALVORSEN
307 - Chris COOPER

New Riders:
Vittore VESPA, 54-74-72-46-55-69.2pavé, 61reg, joins the team only 2 months after his Italian friend Bonifacio Ballabeni had joined. Both want to ride the Giro twice in their career, but not sure if Vespa will really make it. Training will be key for him, who has the potential to become a classic with strong flat and pavé.

Statistic of the month: Most maglia ciclamino Wins by Teams

May is coming! The Giro is coming! Time to get excited and so it's interesting to look at most ciclamino wins. Thanks to Fabio Fonda in 2018 and JJ in 2019 and 2020, we are in the list! But Alkworld has three as well and Team FL has incredible 4 maglia ciclaminos! Let's see, who will win this prestigious jersey in 2021! Can we extend our unique 3-year streak? Our Dutch dynamite is ready (VanDerVeen, Zevenbergen and DeWit)!

4 - Team FL (2013, 2015, 2016, 2017)
3 - Alkworld (2013, 2018, 2020)
3 - Gipfelstuermer (2018, 2019, 2020)

Goals for May 2021:
maglia rosa and maglia ciclamino!

[Gipfelstuermer]

May 2021: DeWit slaying stages but not GC

Result:
Races: 26
Race wins: 5
Points this month: 9,228
"Season" points: 15,011
World Tour points: 1,474
Result: #3 in Div1

Important races:
The Giro. After an excellent Giro preparation (1st @Provence, 3rd @Pais Vasco, 2nd @Romandie), Willem DE WIT was slaying his opponents on the hilly/mountain stages. He won 3 stages and was allowed to live his dream as he wore the maglia rosa for 7 days. In the end, 30'' were missing on TT hero Tim Eiffel and 23'' were missing on Mountain hero Suero Skeljvik, but it was a fantastic Giro. In addition to DeWit's performance, Bartholomäus BRANDT won the prestigious Strade Bianche stage to Montalcino and Bonifacio BALLABENI won the maglia bianca!

Rider of the month:
Willem DE WIT, as illustrated impressive statistics during the Giro:
1.) He won 3 Giro stages, which is the most Giro stages in one edition for a Gipfelstuermer (JJ hat 2 in 2019 and 2 in 2020).
2.) He wore the maglia rosa for 7 days, which makes him the first Gipfelstuermer ever to wear the maglia rosa and it is also the second-best result for a Gipfelstuermer during a Grand Tours (Fabio FONDA wore the maillot jaune for 8 days during the 2018 TDF).
3.) He finished on the podium but eventually got beaten by Tim Eiffel and Suero Skeljvik. So DE WIT is the first Gipfelstuermer to achieved a podium place at the Giro and only the second Gipfelstuermer who achieved a podium place at any of the Grand Tours (Fabio FONDA was 3rd at the 2018 TDF).

Grand Tours - Days in Leader Jersey (Total 20)

8 - Fabio FONDA (8 days in Maillot Jaune 2018)
7 - Willem DE WIT* (7 days in Maglia Rosa 2021)
2 - Mateo MONTESINOS (2 days in Maillot Jaune 2018)
2 - Bartholomäus BRANDT (2 days in Maillot Rojo 2020)
1 - Jacob JJ JEFFERSON (1 day in Maillot Jaune 2019)

Training:
DeWit surprisingly up to 86 mountain! Nice! But Ballabeni only took 1 of 4 trainings at 70%, which is underwhelming as now he has only 8 of 12 trainings in total. 80 mountain again really bad for someone who started at 72 mountain... Just as bad as Kapusta who went from 71 to 79 and then completely stopped... so June training will be very important for Ballabeni's career at the team. The plan was to have him for all GT's in 2021 and 2022... still hoping that he can live up to the expectations.
A positive surprise came from Thijs Van 'T Wout who is now 88 flat! That's strong and he can even hope for more training!

Finances:
+1,933,219 is an excellent result thanks to Romandie and Giro. I remember one Giro I had lost over 1 million... So currently much better Situation financially.

Retired Riders:
-

New Riders:
Aldo ABBIATI, 54-73-76-50-56-64.6pavé, 45reg, is another classic rider after we signed Savoie and Vespa recently. With 3 classics, I hope at least one of them trains nicely

Famara FAYE, 48-72-79-48-53-66.9pavé, 47reg, joins as the 6th FAYE in RSF history after Cheik Faye (Big Donkey), Babacar Faye (Team Seven Down), Baaba Faye (Big Donkey), Demba Faye (Team Seven Down) and Jambaar Faya (CircleCycle).

Statistic of the month: Most maillot vert Wins by Teams

Le Tour de France starting in June! Which teams won the most maillot vert in the past?

6 - BSE Marzahn (2007, 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012)
3 - Team Franconia (2008, 2011, 2012)
3 - Alkworld (2012, 2016, 2020)
3 - SM Team (2013, 2014, 2016)
3 - Trekken Racing (2017, 2018, 2019)
3 - Gipfelstuermer (2018, 2019, 2020)

Goals for June 2021:
Conquer the maillot jaune and win Div1

[Gipfelstuermer]

June 2021: The Dutch dream of yellow

Result:
Races: 25
Race wins: 2
Points this month: 2,745
"Season" points: 7,458
World Tour points: 120
Result: #16 in Div1

Important races:
We raced Tour de Suisse in preparation for Tour de France and of course the first 5 stages of La Grand Boucle. Tour de Suisse was a disaster given very bad form. In a strong evening peloton with 14 teams we really went down completely, except for Bonifacio Ballabeni taking the white jersey. However, a bad rehearsal often makes for a nice show later on. We went to the Tour with a very Dutch team, led by DeWit for the mountains and VanDerVeen for the mass sprints, but it was their friend Joost Zevenbergen who won the first stage after the Grand Depart in Brest! A stage win and a day in yellow! What a dream for the team, especially as the peloton is once again super strong with 13 big teams, including not only superstar teams such as Pokemonogatari and Los Galacticos but also other very experienced teams like Idefix, NoPikouze, lesossies and Bearclaw.

Rider of the month:
Joost ZEVENBERGEN after winning the Grand Depart of this year's Tour de France and so wearing the maillot jaune for one day. He is the 4th Gipfelstuermer to wear the maillot jaune after Mateo Montesinos & Fabio Fonda in 2018 and Jacob JJ Jefferson in 2019.

Training:
Absolutely shitty. No positive surprise really and Ballabeni trained so bad, we had to fire him.

Finances:
-275,918 due to Tour de Suisse disaster and riding only few one day races.

Retired Riders:
Bartholomäus BRANDT retires at the age of 34 after 7 race wins in 203 races. He achieved the magic triple of winning one stage at every Grand Tours (1x TDF '20, 1x Vuelta '20, 1x Giro '21). He is the 2nd Gipfelstuermer to achieve that after famous Jacob JJ Jefferson.

Sold Riders:
Bonifacio BALLABENI had to leave the team after he could not live up to the team's high expectations for a Grand Tours leader. While he won the youth classification at Romandie, Giro & Tour de Suisse, his training attitude was just ridiculous. He not only missed his first mountain training at 99%, he only went from 72 mountain to 81 mountain in total.... that is only 9 of 16 trainings! Unacceptable for the team and a clear sign for future riders, that training is necessary to stay within our team.

New Riders:
-

Gipfel Statistic of the month:

This year our Rider of the month award is really dominated by our Dutch team members.

Rider of the Month Award
2020.06 - Joost ZEVENBERGEN*
2021.05 - Willem DE WIT*
2021.04 - Willem DE WIT*
2021.03 - Bartholomäus BRANDT
2021.02 - Willem DE WIT*
2021.01 - Dries VAN DER VEEN*

General Statistic of the month:

Most points per race for teams with >365 races.

365 races beacuse that could theoretically be one year of playing... but most teams in this list have >1000 races anyway. Well, I think statistic still heavily on dependent on which races you ride... anyway some interesting names and perhaps next moth I come up with a more significant statistic again In the meantime, check out my old statistics of the month! Some are nice!

234.72 - The worsd one
213.78 - fantasticos
208.45 - Mangahns Mannen
202.91 - Alkworld
202.59 - Los Ticos
195.73 - Vuvuzela
188.94 - Kaju
186.20 - RideforMoney
181.97 - SK Blu-Bardhe
180.19 - Adler

Goals for July 2021:
We have our TDF stage win and also a day in yellow, so anything above that will be difficult... but we need some targets! Re-conquer the maillot jaune, I would say! And on 31st July San Sebastian is a great target!

[Gipfelstuermer]

July 2021: DeWit and the Number 3

Result:
Races: 25
Race wins: 4
Points this month: 5,898
"Season" points: 7,385
Result: #15 in Div1

Important races:
We had a great time at the 22h Tour de France among all the big teams there, including Poke, Gala, Bear, Ide and many others. And DeWit with a fantastic performance! In a field with multiple stronger climbers, he managed to finish on the podium behind the two superstars Beauvue and deMarchi but he left Lopez, Ondoa, Tille, Thunders, Agonago and other climbers behind him. The result is excellent for our team especially as we had other nice moments in the race as well. Zevenbergen won the first stage and wore the maillot jaune for one day. And then DeWit... 3 stages + maillot vert! Formidable!
After Le Tour, we participated in the Tour de Wallonie, where Majerus took a suprise GC win! Very nice result for him and the team! And then yesterday, San Sebastian... DeWit beaten in the sprint by Eiffel... grrr... ok, so our amazing GT but bad classics results continue. Looking forward to La Vuelta then!

Rider of the month:
Willem DE WIT! After 3rd place at the afternoon Giro, now 3rd place at the evening TDF. Moreover, after 3 stage wins at the Giro, he also took 3 stage wins at the TDF! But, not enough... despite 8 flat stages at this year's TDF, he beat all the sprinters and won the maillot vert.

Training:
DeWit with some random cover training, now 86-60-80-53-59. Quite nice values for a climber, even if some more climbing skill would help more Then our young classics training going very mediocre... They are still young but so far... Savoie 70-75 with 24-years after starting values of 56-71 is bad. Vespa 66-78 with 23-years after starting value 54-74 is not much better... Abbiati 62-80 with 22-years after starting value 54-73 is a bit better. But important months are coming for all of them...

Finances:
+1,946,040 thanks to excellent results at Le Tour and Wallonie.

Retired Riders:
Dries VAN DER VEEN, our only sprinter, retired after his second Tour de France. He was part of the team that helped JJ win his 2nd maillot vert in 2020 and now he helped DeWit to go onto the podium and win another maillot vert for the team. It may be unprecented for a pure sprinter like Van Der Veen to help two other riders win the maillot vert, but so he deserves even more respect for serving the team! In total, VanDerVeen raced 210 races, including 5 sprint wins for him. So he makes it onto our list of riders with >5 race wins!


Sold Riders:
-

New Riders:
Giacomo GERBI, on of many great-grandsons of Giovanni Gerbi, the first rider to win Il Lombardia, is joining the team. He starts with values being 55-72-70-47-50-73.5-41reg. We'll have to see how his training goes and then decide if he should become a classic or more of a pavé rider with some ability to survive small mountains.

Felix FISCHER, a great-great-grandson of Josef Fischer, the first rider to win Paris-Roubaix, is joining the team. He starts with values being 50-72-73-46-47-70.5-37reg. It is clear that he wants to follow in the footsteps of his famous grand-grand-grand-dad.

Gipfel Statistic of the month:
The team's maillot vert streak.
DeWit continued the team's maillot vert streak! 4x in a row maillot vert! After Fonda in 2018, JJ in 2019 and 2020, now DeWit in 2021! Two more maillot vert's and we reach the level of BSE Marzahn

Willem DE WIT - Maillot Vert 2021
Jacob JJ JEFFERSON - Maillot Vert 2020
Jacob JJ JEFFERSON - Maillot Vert 2019
Fabio FONDA - Maillot Vert 2018

View the complete statistic here on Page 1

General Statistic of the month:
Most maillot verde wins.
La Vuelta is approaching soon and so it is interesting to look at the most maillot verde wins. Very different from the maglia ciclamino and the maillot vert, the maglia verde very often goes to pure climbers. This is not only because of the boring Vuelta designs with many mountain arrivals in recent years (this year looks a bit more versatile though! ) but also because of the points scale at the Vuelta, were every stage gives the same amount of points, no matter whay type of stage it is. Funny enough, as a team that won 3x maglia ciclamino and 4x maillot vert in a row, we never won the maillot verde.

4 - Alkworld (2012, 2013, 2014, 2017)
4 - Lorient (2014, 2015, 2019, 2020)
3 - Hansa-Team (2009, 2010, 2011)

Goals for August 2021:
Starting at the Vuelta, most likely evening. DeWit for the win!

[Gipfelstuermer]

August 2021: Italian weeks in Norway and Spain

Result:
Races: 28
Race wins: 3
Points this month: 3,305
"Season" points: 8,986
Result: #8 in Div1

Important races:
Vuelta still ongoing with L RSV and Los Galacticos with their >600k+ teams dominating seven <500k teams. Not much fun during Vuelta, mostly boring stages. Vuelta stage designers always being like ________/ ..... but 25-years young Vittore Vespa was able to steal stage 5 victory! GC fight is between deMarchi (Gala) and Trkman (L RSV) accordingly but they never really battled each other in August... maybe this comes in September or Mangahn or myself (for DeWit) have to try someting. Anyway, all this Vuelta racing happened after our second Italian prospect to become a classic, 24-years young Aldo Abbiati, had won the Arctic Race of Norway in the beginning of the month! So overall, nice Italian weeks in Norway and Spain!

Rider of the month:
Vittore VESPA! A stage at the Vuelta is a stage at the Vuelta!

Training:
It's bad, it's bad.... Savoie from 56-71 to 70-75 after 5 months very disappointing.... Vespa from 54-74 to 69-78 after 4 months disappointing .... no positive surprises whatsoever.... But! Abbiati! From 54-73 to 66-80 after 3 months looks solid! Keep going! Forza, Forza!

Finances:
+300,743 looks worse than it is. Should recover some of that with the Vuelta ending on Sunday.

Retired Riders:
-

Sold Riders:
-

New Riders:
Viktor VON GÖDRICH, a great-great-great-great-grandson of August von Gödrich, the German participant and silver-medal winner of the 1896 Olympic Road Race in Athens. His starting values are 49-56-76-50-77-63.2, 40reg. He is supposed to ride a lot of sprint races in the off-season and then we'll see if he can play a role in the 2022 season as well.

Gipfel Statistic of the month:
Grand Tours - Stage Wins. Vittore Vespa is the 17th Gipfelstuermer winning a Grand Tour stage. Jacob JJ Jefferson is leading the ranking with incredible 12 wins, followed by currently still riding Willem DeWit with 6 wins.

Grand Tours - Stage Wins (Total 40)

12 - Jacob JJ JEFFERSON (2x Giro '19, 1x TDF '19, 5x Vuelta '19, 2x Giro '20, 2x TDF '20)
6 - Willem DE WIT* (3x Giro '21, 3x TDF '21)
3 - William WASHINGTON (3x Vuelta '17)
3 - Bartholomäus BRANDT (1x TDF '20, 1x Vuelta '20, 1x Giro '21)
2 - Fabio FONDA (1x Giro '18, 1x TDF '18)
2 - Magnus MARTINSEN (2x TDF '18)
2 - Bastien BOULANGER (1x TDF '20, 1x Vuelta '20)
1 - Anibal ALVES (1x Vuelta '17)
1 - Oscar OLIVEIRA (1x Vuelta '17)
1 - Carlos CHIMBO (1x Giro '19)
1 - Trevorvano THOMPSON (1x Giro '19)
1 - Esteban ECHEVARRIA (1x TDF '19)
1 - Matti MYYRY (1x TDF '19)
1 - Ole OVERBY (1x Vuelta '19)
1 - Sigurd SANDVIK (1x Vuelta '19)
1 - Joost ZEVENBERGEN* (1x TDF '21)
1 - Vittore VESPA* (1x Vuelta '21)

View the complete statistic here on Page 1

General Statistic of the month:
Most maillot rojo wins.
La Vuelta is not everyone's race, but some teams have been very active and successful:

4 - Alkworld (2008, 2012, 2014, 2021)
3 - LosTicos (2007, 2008, 2009)
3 - Liquigas-CND (2016, 2017, 2018)

Goals for September 2021:
Create some action at the Vuelta, maybe try somethin with DeWit against the two dominating teams. Then go on holiday. 2-3 weeks no RSF, instead ride my bike in the French Alps! Nice! See you all end of September or beginning of October then! Il Lombardia is coming!

[Gipfelstuermer]

September & October 2021: From Vuelta straight into off-season


The team went on holiday after Vuelta, skipped the late classics and went straight into off-season. So with only 8 races in September and 18 races in October, here is one report for both months:

Important races
Last week of Vuelta was much more interesting than the first two weeks with very boring profiles. Every day we saw GC attacks from Mangahn or L RSV or our team. But Gala played very well, made no big mistakes and so deMarchi won the GT triple 1'49'' ahead of DeWit who avoided the GT 3rd place triple, but of course he isn't happy with 2nd place, either. At least his Dutch friend Joost Zevenbergen won stage 19, so the team can be happy with the overall result.'
The off-season then started with the irrelevant Saudi Tour followed by the famous Tour des Pavés. We came with a very strong Pavé team and then This Van 'T Wout even trained up to 90 flat / 87.6 pavé during the tour. Our pavé heroes were in excellent form, giving Van 'T Wout and Gerbi one stage win each, plus a 1-2 in GC (Thijs ahead of Giacomo) plus points classification (Thijs) plus youth classification (Giacomo).

Rider of the month
September: Joost ZEVENBERGEN - A stage win at the Vuelta is worth something.
October: Thijs VAN 'T WOUT with a superb performance at the Tour des Pavés (GC, 1 stage, points jersey)

Training:
Well, cannot complain about Thijs. 90 flat is extraordinary and so we hope he keeps his form into April 2022. But the others... Savoie, Vespa and Abbiati are three weak classics at the moment (71-76, 71-78, 69-80)... They have time to train in the winter but I doubt we have any strong classic in 2022 which could become a big problem for all our targets.

Finances:
+1,513,679 in September thanks to Vuelta.
+1,793,930 in October despite very few races. Good start into off-season financially.

Retired Riders:
Joost ZEVENBERGEN retired at the age of 35 after 7 race wins in 281 races for the Gipfelstuermers. The Dutch classic rider (one of many training disappointments) had his qualities in attacking and escaping. His biggest success was winning the first stage of this year's Tour de France in Landerneau, thanks to a late attack from him and Van 'T Wout 17km before the finish. This success allowed him to spend one day in the maillot jaune.

Sold Riders:
-

New Riders:
Pierre PAGIE, a great-great-great-grandson of Émile Pagie, a Belgian participant at the first Tour de France in 1903. His starting values are 72-54-74-50-56-55.8, 50reg. Not sure if he wants to become a pure climber or a 80-70 specialist.

Normal Stats of the month
Races: 8 | 18
Race wins: 1 | 3
Points: 3,102 | 2,992
"Season" points: 6,406 | 5,379
Result: #15 in Div1 | #22 in Div1

Gipfel Statistic of the month:
Classics raced most often by our team. After another weak classics season (0 wins), it is time to look at our results during classics so far. MSR and Amstel we raced 4x each (still never won them, only 2nd places). Hamburg, Bretagne, Bruxelles, Montreal, we never raced. But those nobody really cares about, I guess. Our team's favorite seem to be the Italian classics in general. Strade Bianche, Tre Valli Varesine and Emilia we all won once and ot a 2nd place once in history... Anyway, we need to improve this list in 2022!

Participations - Flag - Race (1st-2nd-3rd)
4 - Milan - San Remo (0-1-0)
4 - Amstel Gold Race (0-1-0)
3 - Omloop Het Nieuwsblad (0-1-0)
3 - Strade Bianche (1-1-0)
3 - E3 Harelbeke (0-0-2)
3 - Gent - Wevelgem (0-0-0)
3 - Dwars Door Vlaanderen (0-1-0)
3 - Ronde van Vlaanderen (0-1-1)
3 - Paris - Roubaix (0-0-1)
3 - Luttich - Bastogne - Luttich (0-0-0)
3 - San Sebastian (0-0-1)
3 - Tre Valli Varesine (1-1-0)
3 - Il Lombardia (0-1-0)
3 - Tours (0-0-1)
2 - De Panne (1-0-0)
2 - Brabant (0-0-1)
2 - Fleche Wallone (0-0-0)
2 - Emilia (1-1-0)
2 - Milano - Torino (0-0-0)
1 - Scheldeprijs (0-0-0)
1 - Rund um den Turm (0-1-0)
1 - GP Quebec (0-0-0)
1 - Piemonte (0-0-0)
0 - GP Hamburg (0-0-0)
0 - Bretagne (0-0-0)
0 - GP Bruxelles (0-0-0)
0 - GP Montreal (0-0-0)


General Statistic of the month:
Most December Tours designed. With the ongoing contest for the 2021 December Tour, it is interesting to see who had the most participations since 2010. Poke really the DecTour-addict here, but some other regular designers here as well.
9,5 - Pokemon Club (Pokemonogatari)
7 - Robyklebt (Big Donkey)
5 - Whisbone
5 - sylvainmeteo (SM Team)
4,5 - olmania (OLCycle)
4 - Gipfelstuermer
3 - el Galactico (Los Galacticos)
3 - Chense (Team Trojer Vellau)
3 - Moscow Pro Team (Mosca)
3 - Falkenbier
3 - Tukh (Tukhtahuaev)
2 - cataracs (Dickson PRT)
2 - Hanse (Hansa)
2 - High Flyer
2 - Novo Banco - PT
2 - Vea Olio
2 - Coroncina

Goals for November 2021:
The highlight should be 16 days in the Andes. Looking forward to this tough race. DeWit the captain, but the young riders should also have some freedom during the race.

[Gipfelstuermer]

November 2021: Forming a new generation as DeWit retired

Important races
16-days in the Andes were very exhausting but also very exciting. It was a nice GC fight between Gala, Poke, Bear and our team. But once again, it was Gala with his dream team, who secured the GC win for Luca deMarchi, in particular thanks to the super domestique Dolberg. In the end, we can be happy that DeWit won a stage and secured 2nd place in GC for our team.

Rider of the month
Willem DE WIT - Winning stage 13 of this year's Andes was very nice, particularly how it happened. On a 240km stage, we isolated GC leader deMarchi who then did not follow DeWit's attack on the final climb to Laguna de Cuicocha. Probably our best move during the tour and also decisive to become 2nd in GC (not proud of it though).

Training:
Savoie, Vespa and Abbiati not doing anything (71-76, 71-78, 69-80)... Grrr... I doubt they will train during winter and that gives me a big headache on how to ride in 2022 without any strong classics...

Finances:
+963,137 not too bad given that Andes was a money burning exercise as usual... well, I think Andes was +/- 0 after all... so not too bad... but the financial surplus was important to hire two new riders (see below!)

Retired Riders:
Willem DE WIT retired after a remarkable career with the Gipfelstuermer team. He was the leader of the team for most of 2021. With his skills of 86-58-80, he was the best climber the team has ever had and we had lots of fun riding for him, especially during the Giro, where he won 3 stages and wore the maglia rosa for 7 days. The Tour was also nice as he won 3 stages there as well. Unfortunately, DE WIT was strong in winning stages, but could not win a Grand Tours as he had super strong opponents. Still, he has some great achievements. See below in the Gipfel statistics of the month.

Vojtech VARGA also retired this month after being a helper in 288 races. Thank you, Vojtech!

Sold Riders:
-

New Riders:
Luuk LOOTENS, a great-great-great-grandson of Julien Lootens, a Belgian participant at the first Tour de France in 1903. His starting values are 70-56-75-61-56-61.6, 39reg. With his talent, he is very likely to start for our team at the 2022 Tour de France, but he will have to fight with Pierre PAGIE for the leader role within the team.

Casper CATTEAU, a great-great-great-grandson of Alois Catteau, another Belgian participant at the first Tour de France in 1903. His starting values are 54-71-79-48-45-63.2, 47reg. His Signing was last-minute as normally we would not need another classic for the 2022 season. However, with 3 classics unable to train, he will have a good chance to ride a lot of races. I mean, he only needs to reach 71-78 to become the best of our 4 classics....

Normal Stats of the month
Races: 27
Race wins: 8
Points: 3,259
"Season" points: 4,664
Result: #3 in Div2 (we are back in Div1 !!)

Gipfel Statistic of the month:
Let's have a look at the achievements of Willem DE WIT, as he retired this month, and how he compares to our most legendary riders Fabio Fonda and Jacob JJ Jefferson. DeWit won 3 stages at the Giro and 3 stages at the Tour. He also won the maillot vert at this year's tour, continuing our streak as we won it every year since 2018. As such, he somehow followed in the footsteps of our great heroes Fabio Fonda and Jacob JJ Jefferson. Overall, he can compare with Fabio Fonda, but JJ was obviously in a league of his own as you can see with his number of race wins and eternal points.

Grand Tours - Stage Wins
12 - Jacob JJ JEFFERSON (2x Giro '19, 1x TDF '19, 5x Vuelta '19, 2x Giro '20, 2x TDF '20)
6 - Willem DE WIT (3x Giro '21, 3x TDF '21)
2 - Fabio FONDA (1x Giro '18, 1x TDF '18)

Grand Tours - Days in Leader Jersey
8 - Fabio FONDA (8 days in Maillot Jaune 2018)
7 - Willem DE WIT (7 days in Maglia Rosa 2021)
1 - Jacob JJ JEFFERSON (1 day in Maillot Jaune 2019)

Race Wins
61 - Jacob JJ JEFFERSON
12 - Fabio FONDA
10 - Willem DE WIT

Eternal Points
24,214 - Jacob JJ JEFFERSON
16,516 - Fabio FONDA
15,691 - Willem DE WIT

General Statistic of the month:
Most December Tour contests won. Congrats, Poke for winning 2021 contest! Now he's in the same league as Tukh and I. 2 victories each.
2 - Pokemon Club (2012, 2021)
2 - Gipfelstuermer (2017, 2019)
2 - Tukh (2018, 2019)
1 - Falkenbier (2010)
1 - Robyklebt (2011)
1 - luques (2013)
1 - Rastaman (2014)
1 - Auxilium Torino (2015)
1 - Whisbone (2016)

Goals for December 2021:
Mmmmhhhh... will ride the December Tour, but let's face reality, it's all about making money and building the 2022 team. Apart from that, kind of looking forward to the new 30-minutes cyclocross races around New Year's. That could be fun!

[Gipfelstuermer]

2021 - what a year!

THE 2021 TEAM
After the JJ era, we tried to build a GC team for 2021. We signed 3 young talented climbers: Kapusta, DeWit and Ballabeni. But training was horrible. Kapusta stopped at 79 mountain and so he had to leave the team. Ballabeni stopped at 81 mountain and also had to leave the team, despite winning the maglia bianca at the Giro. So DeWit became our leader with decent skills of 86-59-80, 53 TT. His most important helpers were Brandt (74-78) and Zevenbergen (71-79). The rest of the team was not very impressive, partly due to training, partly due to bad management.

IMPORTANT RACES
We rode all the Grand Tours, where the team collected 10 stage wins (4x Giro, 4x TDF, 2x Vuelta) thanks to 4 riders (6x DeWit, 2x Zevenbergen, 1x Brandt, 1x Vespa). The team also provided great support to DeWit as the GC leader, who landed on the podium for all three Grand Tours, but could not deliver the Grand Tours win we were dreaming of. That result was acceptable while the classic season was a disaster with 0 important wins. Ok, we could not start at some of the classics (Lombardia and some smaller classics), but still the team will need to put more focus on classics in 2022.

RIDER OF THE YEAR
Willem DE WIT! He became 3rd at the Giro (Skeljvik from fantasticos unbeatable), again 3rd at the Tour and 2nd at the Vuelta (both times deMarchi from Galacticos unbeatable), but still we had a lot of fun with him! He was mostly an underdog in these Tours but could still deliver 3 Giro stage wins and 3 TDF stage wins! Thanks to 80 downhill skill! Moreover, he won the maillot vert at the Tour and thereby extended our maillot vert streak to 4 years - after Fonda in 2018 and JJ in 2019 and 2020. Interestingly, all the maillot vert winners became rider of the year later on!

2021 - Willem DE WIT
2020 - Jacob JJ JEFFERSON
2019 - Jacob JJ JEFFERSON
2018 - Fabio FONDA
2017 - Oscar OLIVEIRA
2016 - No Racing
2015 - No Racing
2014 - No Racing
2013 - No Racing
2012 - Karim KHAIR
2011 - Jose JANUARIO
2010 - No Racing
2009 - Carloe TEVEZ

STATS
Races: 300 (+11 vs. 2020)
Race wins: 50 (-13)
Points: 49,370 (+1,054)

C4F WORLD TOUR 2021 STATS
Race Wins: 14 (2020:14; 2019: 28)
Ranking by Race Wins: #12 (2020: #14, 2019: #9)
Points: 5,155 (2020: 3,965; 2019: 3,420)
Ranking by Points: #10 (2020: #15; 2019: #20)
Best Rider: Willem DE WIT (#8 with 18 wins / #5 with 3,815 points)

OUTLOOK FOR 2022
We signed two promising Belgian climbers: Pierre PAGIE and Luuk LOOTENS. Their strengths are very different though. Pierre is a pure climber (started 72-54) without TT (50) but good reg (50). Luuk is not a super strong climber (started 70-56) and he has little reg (39) but he has some strength in TT (61) and good pavé (started 61.1). Let's hope for good training for both! Because the classics who are supposed to support them are no training heroes so far...

As classics, we have Aldo ABBIATI with 69-80 (started 54-73), Severin SAVOIE with 71-76 (started 56-71) and Vittore VESPA with 72-78 (started 54-74). Not very impressive. We don't plan to fire anyone of them, but with Casper CATTEAU we hired a young rider (started 54-71-79) who could become part of the Grand Tours line-up as well. There were also some rumours in the press, that the team could hire another classic! But we do not comment on such rumours.... But I can say, at the moment none of them is a guaranteed starter for the Grand Tours. It will all depend on training.

There will also be the question, how many classics we need to send to Grand Tours at all. Especially as we have Giacomo GERBI (60-85) and Felix FISCHER (56-86) who could also be great helpers during a 3-week stage race.

Unlike last year, we also have some very interesting domestiques in the team. Thijs VAN'T WOUT currently has impressive 90 flat and Famara FAYE has impressive 91 downhill.

And we have a sprinter, too! Viktor VON GÖÐRICH (50-70-76 with 82 sprint) would love to target the maglia ciclamino and/or the maillot vert. He says, somebody needs to continue our 4-year maillot vert streak! But even if we try to do that, I doubt we'll try with a sprinter... in the last 4-years, we always won the maillot vert with a climber (DeWit, Fonda) or hill sprinter (2x JJ) so I see no reason to try with a pure sprinter. But let's see. If our GC ambitions go down in the drain for some reason... then taking Viktor could be an ooption.

Then for the monuments, we have the same riders to choose from of course. For MSR... well, we don't have a hill sprinter... so the plan will probably be to win out of an escape! How nice would that be! For RVV and PR, we have an interesting team though. VAN'T WOUT, GERBI & FISCHER all want to be leaders there. But the calendar is also challenging us this year... RVV on the 3rd of April and PR and 17th of April mean form settings will be crucial. And then there's LBL on the 24th of course. PAGIE and LOOTENS are looking at that, but normally it's a race that goes to classics, so probably we can't be amongst the favorites.

Looking forward to all the big races !

[Gipfelstuermer]

OUTLOOK FOR 2022

...

As classics, we have Aldo ABBIATI with 69-80 (started 54-73), Severin SAVOIE with 71-76 (started 56-71) and Vittore VESPA with 72-78 (started 54-74). Not very impressive. We don't plan to fire anyone of them, but with Casper CATTEAU we hired a young rider (started 54-71-79) who could become part of the Grand Tours line-up as well. There were also some rumours in the press, that the team could hire another classic! But we do not comment on such rumours.... But I can say, at the moment none of them is a guaranteed starter for the Grand Tours. It will all depend on training.

...

Last minute transfer!

The rumours were correct! Today we signed 21-years-old Florent FABER (56-73-79-51-49-66.1pavé, 52reg), a grand-grand-grand-son of Francois Faber, the first Luxembourgish Tour de France participant (in 1907) and first Luxembourgish Tour de France winner (in 1909). He will fight with the two Italians VESPA and ABBIATI, his fellow Luxemburger SAVOIE and recently signed Belgian hope CATTEAU for a spot in our Grand Tours line-up in 2022. 5 classics for 1-3 spots in the line-up seems much, but given our training luck, it will not be a hard fight. Could be enough to reach 71 or 72 mountain to become part of the team! Bienvenue and Willkommen Florent!

[Gipfelstuermer]

January 2022: Cyclocross World Champion

Important races
January and important races... well, there are not many! But ok, we had the off-season classics, out of which Severin Savoie won his home race, and traditional first race of the year, GP Letzebuerg (Cat.3!!). It is also a tradition that our team wins the first race of the new year. Savoie is the 3rd Gipfelstuermer to win this race, after Thompson in 2019 and JJ in 2020. We also had the re-start of the road racing season with the 5 Challenge Mallorca one day races. We participated in two of them but couldn't get a good result there. Last but not least, we took part in some of the new cyclocross races, including the World Championship with our Belgian hero Thijs Van'T Wout becoming the first C4F Cyclocross World Champion! He will wear the rainbow jersey in the remaining Cyclocross races in February!

Rider of the month
Thijs VAN'T WOUT is a world-known pavé rider with 87.6 pavé but the way he won the Cyclocross World Championship in Fayetteville, was exceptional even for a rider of his strength. In a field with 11 out of the 23 best-skilled pavé riders, including riders like Rui Aguas (85.6), Greg Goosens (83.4) and Arnaud Demeester (83.2), he played things cool and attacked on the last +2***. Some tried to follow, but nobody had the strength. Congrats, Thijs! Well deserved to be rider of the month! It is his second rider of the month title after he won it already in October 2021 where he won the Tour des Pavés.

Training:
Seems it paid off to hire two more classics. Catteau and Faber really put big pressure on Vespa, Savoie and Abbiati, so that they took some small surprise training. Vespa up to 72-78. Savoie stayed 71-76 but now 60 sprint and Abbiati took the step to 70-80. In the meantime, Pagie took only 2x mountains. 82 after 3 months... hopefully the same strategy as with the classics can work next month. Lootens is supposed to put some pressure on Pagie!

Finances:
+1,952,303 is a very good month financially. We are very close to the maximum 70% tax now! Might actually have it by tomorrow when rider's values change.

Retired Riders:
-

Sold Riders:
-

New Riders:
-

Normal Stats of the month
Races: 26
Race wins: 7
Points: 3,061
"Season" points:6,008
Result: #5 in Div1

Gipfel Statistic of the month:
With Severin Savoie joining the 5-race-wins-club, it is a good time to look at the club. Savoie is the 17th Gipfelstuermer to join this club. If he was to win another 5 races, he'd join the clearly more elite 10-race-wins-club, consisting out of the legendary JJ, Italian Fabio Fonda, Colombian Esteban Echevarria and Dutch Willem DeWit. However, one current rider is younger and already closer to this goal: Giacomo Gerbi is only 26 years old and has already won 8 races!

61 - Jacob JJ JEFFERSON ★All-Time Nr. 2★
12 - Fabio FONDA
11 - Esteban ECHEVARRIA
10 - Willem DE WIT
8 - Sigurd SANDVIK
8 - Giacomo GERBI*
7 - Ole OVERBY
7 - Bartholomäus BRANDT
7 - Joost ZEVENBERGEN
6 - Bayron BOYCE
6 - William WASHINGTON
6 - Boas BERGSTEINSSON
6 - Bastien BOULANGER
5 - Oscar OLIVEIRA
5 - Trevorvano THOMPSON
5 - Dries VAN DER VEEN
5 - Severin SAVOIE*

*still riding

General Statistic of the month:
Oldest riders of all time. With Alejandro Valverde being 41 and still winning Pro Races, I was wondering about the Valverde's of C4F... Mh? What? Doesn't everybody retire with 39? No! There were some riders who got older in the early times of RSF! So who was the oldest riders winning races in RSF? Unfortunately we do not know.... Who was the oldest rider still riding races? We also don't know... But one thing we know, who were the oldest riders existing! Some got 45 years old! Wow! And their skills when they retired were also impressive Especially the -3 (!) sprint skill of Gunter Hummer is impressive! In fact, he is the only rider in all C4F history with a negative skill Probably the first rider who cause a bug!

45 years - Rudi Abblbach (Quick-step, 421 eternal points): 17-22-09-10-17-18.4
45 years - Gunter Hummer (RV Allagen, 238 eternal points): 30-24-10-7-(-3)-18.9
45 years - Johannes Nebauer (Mangahns Mannen, 202 eternal points): 26-09-40-7-11-8.4
44 years - Antonio Perez (Team RBB, 5,683 eternal points): 53-08-55-21-26-11.9
44 years - Davide Rebellin (Gerolsteiner, 3,850 eternal points): 27-44-12-09-21-33.5

Goals for February 2022:
Our race program is clear: Valenciana, Provence, Algarve, Omloop. No time for UAE even if it is part of the World Tour now. Provence is a nice race in particular. Good memories as DeWit won the Tour last year. But then again it was his only GC win... so I'd prefer not to win Provence and instead win a more important tour this year

[flockmastoR]

Haha great statistics, -3 sprint skill.
Think we also have a manager with negative skill in the afternoon (Mobster I am looking at you )

[Weezel]

Haha great statistics, -3 sprint skill.
Think we also have a manager with negative skill in the afternoon (Mobster I am looking at you )

Is there a second Mobster with bad skills?
Don't know him yet...

[Gipfelstuermer]

February 2022: Training luck but only in downhill

Important races
The season is slowly re-starting and so February was more fun. The team took part in Valenciana, Provence and Algarve before going to Ninove for Omloop Het Nieuwsblad. In all three tours we were able to win the youth classement. 2x Pagie and 1x Lootens. Pagie in particular surprised as he won the king stage of Provence vs. the much stronger Trakhtenbrot (83 vs. 87 mountain) and so only missed the GC-win by a few seconds. Then Omloop Het Nieuwsblad, we rode the evening edition with very strong pavé teams (Bearclaw, Benfica, Spree). Gerbi tried a Wout VanAert style attack on the Bosberg but different from his idol, there was one guy who could follow: Schiffbauer (Spree) with more mountain, more pavé, more sprint. They rode together for a while, then Schiffbauer alone and it looked like a sprint between the two. But on the last km the group behind (consisting out of 2 Bears and our second guy Thijs Van 'T Wout) caught up. Gerbi got 2nd place in the sprint behind winner Darren Berrecloth (Bear). Congrats Darren.

Rider of the month
Pierre PAGIE as he was able to beat Boaz Traktenbrot - one of the best GC riders in RSF at the moment - on the Montagne de Lure during Tour de la Provence. Very nice stage win for him. Even if it was not enough for winning GC, there were some signs that Pierre can become a strong mountain rider.

Training:
Famara FAYE! What a legend as he reached 93 downhill! The rest was more normal Gip training though... Pagie 12/16 mountain very much average... Lootens 9/12 mountain seems bad... Van 'T Wout of course took the 10% opportunity to downtrain flat way before the pavé classics are coming... so it seems we are only lucky in downhill training!

Finances:
+1,098,841 is good enough for the team at the moment. We reached 70% tax recently and seems we'll stay among the rich teams!

Retired Riders:
Matthieu MAJERUS retires at the age of 39 after impressive 315 races with 2 race wins! Matthieu would have like to continue, especially as he would have liked to continue wearing the Luxembourgish national champion jersey! He held it since October 2020, so for incredible 17 months! Probably new record in RSF!

Sold Riders:
-

New Riders:
-

Normal Stats of the month
Races: 25
Race wins: 2
Points: 3,478
"Season" points: 6,392
Result: #7 in Div1

Gipfel Statistic of the month:
With Majerus' retirement and his new record for holding a national championship jersey, let's look at the National Championships the team has won! Colombia and Luxembourg probably the most prestigious countries in terms of cycling in the list. But the most famous rider in the list is the Norwegian Ole OVERBY, who used to be one of the super domestiques of Jacob JJ JEFFERSON.

3 - Bahamas (2x Trevorvano THOMPSON, 1x Bayron BOYCE)
3 - Colombia (2x Esteban ECHEVARRIA, 1x Gael GATO)
3 - Iceland (2x Boas BERGSTEINSSON, 1x Edvin EINARSSON)
3 - Finland (1x Kaapo KEMPPAINEN, 1x Matti MYRRY, 1x Ville VANHATALO)
2 - Brazil (1x Oscar OLIVEIRA, 1x Anibal ALVES)
1 - Ecuador (1x Jairo JIMENEZ)
1 - Luxembourg (1x Matthieu MAJERUS)
1 - Norway (1x Ole OVERBY)
1 - Slovakia (1x Kristian KAPUSTA)
1 - Sweden (1x Theo THORNQUIST)

General Statistic of the month:
Best Downhill Riders of All-Time. We have to show how nice our training luck is. Only in downhill, but who cares? We are breaking records! Fantastic Famara FAYE! But I have to say Famara is really a pure specialist, like the only other rider who reached 92. But there are some really nice combinations in the 90 downhill category: Eggmann 62-80-91 is awesome, Algul 85-57-90 a monster climber and Gavilan 47-85-90 a really strong flat/dh combination.

93 Downhill - Famara FAYE (Gipfelstuermer) 52-72-93-48-53
92 Downhill - Matos RODRIGUEZ (RV Frankfurt) 49-54-92-46-55
91 Downhill - Igor EGGMANN (ErnsBoys) 62-80-91-48-47
91 Downhill - Joe HEITZER (Basel Haie) 54-55-91-50-57
90 Downhill - Rhaz ALGUL (Gnoien Cycling) 85-57-90-43-55
90 Downhill - JuanRamon GAVILAN (Team Flo) 47-85-90-52-41
+ many others who reached 90 downhill

Goals for March 2022:
Strade Bianche on Saturday. The most underrated race in RSF! Cat.4 for the race that's now considered the "the 6th monument" by some? Our team has won this classic before so there is less pressure. Who's the leader? Van'T Wout or Gerbi? Or even Lootens? A difficult decison. Afterwards, we'd like to ride Paris-Nice or Tirreno-Adriatico, but probably the Directeur Sportif is visiting the real world Paris-Nice in Nice, so not sure he will have time to play this game.... After that, we target MSR of course. Who is our leader for San Remo? Can Savoie win out of a classics group? Can we win out of an escape? Not sure what's the tactic but we will try!

[Gipfelstuermer]

March 2022: Gagneux and VVG celebrate victories in Flanders

Important races
We only rode 14 races this month, but luckily we were able to participate in all the big classics. In Italy we had nothing to celebrate though: In Strade Bianche we rode for Luuk Lootens, but he could not follow YazidbinZaini on the final climb. In Milano - San Remo Vittore Vespa attacked on the Poggio but was caught in the run-in to the Via Roma. But in Flanders we delivered thanks to concentrated team efforts: During E3 Harelbeke our pavé riders Van'T Wout, Gerbi and Fischer put in all the work to create a sprint out of a select group of riders for Gaspard Gagneux, who was able to outsprint Omloop-winner Berrecloth from Bearclaw Cycling. In Dwaars door Vlaanderen it was again Gip vs. Bear in the end. We followed a similar strategy, but this time all the pavé riders worked for our German Viktor von Gödrich (VVG) who outsprinted Twan Van Gendt (TVG). Two victories in Flanders. Let's keep going.

Rider of the month
Gaspard GAGNEUX. Difficult decision but E3 Harelbeke slightly more important than DDV in my point view. Therefore the award goes to the 34-years-old Luxembourger.

Training:
Not sure if this month was better or we just get used to our bad training. Pagie 85-59 at 25 years and Lootens 80-63 at 24-years seem acceptable as we knew already that neither of them will be GC favo anywhere. For the young classics, Florent Faber seems to be doing much better at 66-79 than his one-year older colleague Casper Catteau who got stuck at 67-79. Thijs now 49-88. We hope he can keep that up for Roubaix.

Finances:
+341,345 is O.K. as we only rode 14 races and brought super expensive teams to all the classics.

Retired Riders:
-

Sold Riders:
-

New Riders:
Pavlo POULNIKOV (56-70-76-50-45-72.6pavé, 43reg)
Oleksandr OUTSCHAKOV (54-71-79-54-49-66.8pavé, 57reg)
Out of solidarity we boycotted stupid GP de Vladivostok and instead offered two young Ukrainians to train with us: The son of the first Ukrainian national champion Vladimir Poulnikov and the son of Tour de France stage winner Serguei Outschakov. For now, they will simply train with the team, but they are showing some good talent, they are young and hopefully they play an important role in the future!

We now have 16 riders, more than ever before I believe.

Normal Stats of the month
Races: 14
Race wins: 4
Points: 3,118
"Season" points: 6,472
Result: #17 in Div1

Gipfel Statistic of the month:
Classic wins. How often do we have the opportunity to talk about classic wins? Well, not often, so might as well take the opportunity this month. Gagneux and VVG delivered classic wins Nr. 5 and 6 for the team! No Gipfelstuermer has won 2 classics, so Gagneux and VVG are looking forward to next month! But who knows... there might not be another win, so rather post the statistic now!

Les Classiques & Semi-Classiques (Total 6)
Cat. 5 Classiques: Harelbeke, Gent-Wevelgem, Amstel, Fleche Wallone, San Sebastian, Hamburg, Bretagne, Quebec, Montreal, Tours
Cat. 4 Semi-Classiques: Omloop, Strade Bianche, De Panne, DDV, Brabant, Rund um den Turm, GP Bruxelles, GP Fourmies, Emilia, Piemonte, Tre Valli, Milano-Torino

1 - Viktor VON GÖDRICH (DDV 2022)
1 - Gaspard GAGNEUX (E3 Harelbeke 2022)
1 - Jacob JJ JEFFERSON (De Panne 2020)
1 - Sigurd SANDVIK (Tre Valli 2019)
1 - Trevorvano THOMPSON (Strade Bianche 2019)
1 - Jose JANUARIO (Emilia 2011)

--> All Gip Statistics here


General Statistic of the month:
Ukraine is not the biggest cycling nation, but Freudenfeuer has produced some outstanding Ukrainian cyclists! First and foremost, there is Juri PROTASSOW, Giro winner in 2018. But there are two more Freudenfeuer's in the Top 5. If you reach 6,490 points, you can make it to the Top 10. So please, everyone, hire as many Ukrainians as possible! Let's improve the Top 10!

Top 10 Ukrainian Riders by Points
17,005 - Juri PROTASSOW (Freudenfeuer). Biggest win: GIRO 2018
8,648 - Mark KREIN (Radunion). Biggest win: Stage 6 Giro 2015
8,505 - Wlayslaw LUSCHNYJ (Freudenfeuer). Biggest win: Tour of Britain 2013
8,154 - Andriy Hryhoriymov (Elbcoast Riders). Biggest win: Stage 2 Giro 2010
7,914 - Pavel SAPRIKIN (Freudenfeuer). Biggest win: Ukrainian National Champion 2015
7,794 - Iwan FRANKO (Team FL). Biggest win: Omloop 2016
7,505 - Pawel URYSOHN (Radunion). Biggest win: Stage 3 Giro 2013
7,465 - Patrik RUTSKA (Team Erkrath RS). Biggest Win: GP Hamburg 2009.
6,694 - Andrej VORONIN (Team EPO) Biggest win: Stage 2 Tour de Suisse 2007.
6,490 - Dmitri PETRENKO (BVB-Touringteam) Biggest win: Prolog Deutschland Tour 2008


Goals for April 2022:
It's time for the monuments! Can't wait for RVV on Sunday, but we have huge problems with form settings. Would have liked to have the whole team fit for RVV and Roubaix but that's impossible with the calendar. So we'll have to find a different strategy. Then there is L-B-L but if we played a role there, that would be an even bigger surprise than in the other two monuments. With 0 monument wins so far, we'll be underdog in all three races, but at least Gagneux and VVG seem to be in shape!

[Bear]

Nice duo you got for your team.

[Gipfelstuermer]

April 2022: Dreams came true in Oudenaarde & Liège

Important races
The month of the monuments. And what a month it was! After being denied a monument in previous attempts (JJ 2nd in MSR 2020, Brandt 2nd in RVV 2021), this year a dream came true for our team with Gaspard GAGNEUX's fantastic win of De Ronde. In a race against pavé monsters like Schiffbauer and Westergaard, our team effort made the difference. Read the race report here. The first monument for the Gipfelstuermer's! And the second monument followed, unfortunately not in Roubaix where Thijs VAN'T WOUT became 2nd, but in Liège where Vittore VESPA won in remarkable fashion, against strong classics like Unold and Rascon. Read the race report here. Most importantly, all three monuments had decent participation in the evening (11, 8 and 10 teams). Hopefully, from here participation in races goes back up again. Alkworld and I can finally work on the new react version! Improvements should come soon!

Rider of the month
Gaspard GAGNEUX. Difficult decision between him and Vespa but we like RVV slightly more than L-B-L. Also, it was our first monument, so pressure was lower for Vespa.

Training:
Our climber duo refused to train 2 months in a row, putting their Giro participation at risk. Pagie remains 85-59 at 26 years and Lootens 80-63 at 25-years. But, our Italians are very motivated for the Giro. Vespa 74-78 was good already, Abbiati now 72-81 and Gerbi 61-87! Maybe we can produce a big team effort in Italy!

Finances:
+1,256,621 is pretty good after riding mostly one day races during classic season. We missed Tour of the Alps. Romandie not yet finished. So finances are ok.

Retired Riders:
Thijs VAN'T WOUT retires after his 2nd attempt in Roubaix. Neither in 2021 nor in 2022 it was enough for him. We'll remember him as the pavé power machine, with a funny Palmarés. He won the Tour des Pavés 2021 and he became Cyclocross World Champion 2022. In total, he has 5 race wins after 209 races for the team.

Sold Riders:
Severin SAVOIE leaves the team as competition amongst classic riders has become too hard for him. The two Italians are much stronger than he has been and there are two young classic who also put him under pressure. With 70-76, he never reached the level we wished for, but his 60 sprint nonetheless led to 5 race wins. We hope he can find another team, but considering his age of 33 years, we can also understand if he prefers to retire in the end!

New Riders:
-

Normal Stats of the month
Races: 25
Race wins: 3
Points: 6,687
"Season" points: 8,462
Result: #12 in Div1

Gipfel Statistic of the month:
Spring Classic Results 2022 - Clearly our best classics campaign so far!

26.02. Omloop Het Nieuwsblad --> 2nd - Giacomo GERBI
05.03. Strade Bianche --> no podium
19.03. Milano-San Remo --> no podium
23.03. De Panne --> 3rd - Felix FISCHER
25.03. E3 Harelbeke --> 1st - Gaspard GAGNEUX
27.03. Gent–Wevelgem --> no podium
30.03. Dwars door Vlaanderen --> 1st - Viktor VON GÖDRICH
03.04. Ronde Van Vlaanderen --> 1st - Gaspard GAGNEUX
10.04. Amstel Gold Race --> 2nd - Aldo ABBIATI
17.04. Paris–Roubaix --> 2nd - Thijs VAN'T WOUT
20.04. La Flèche Wallonne --> D.N.S.
24.04. Liege–Bastogne–Liege --> 1st - Vittore VESPA

--> All Gip Statistics here


General Statistic of the month:
The month of the monuments, so time to look at the teams with most monument wins: Alkworld dominates the list with 20 wins, but if you'd combine the 2 Poké teams to 15 wins and the 2 Roby teams to 12, they are a bit closer! Anyway, the Gipfelstuermers have a long way to go after 2 monument wins

Most monument wins by team
20 - Alkworld
10 - Lorient
9 - Pokemonogatari
9 - free team
8 - Team FL
7 - Petit Singe
7 - Los Ticos
6 - SM Team
6 - RV Allagen
6 - r Sukuran Pokemon
5 - Skullz
5 - RideforMoney
5 - r Quick
5 - Idefix
5 - lesossies
5 - Falkenbier
5 - Big Donkey

Goals for May 2022:
GIRO! But what are the goals for the Giro? If we send Pagie and Lootens, of course we will go for GC! What's the point going there with a climber if you don't try for GC? If we have no climber, we'll just go for the fun! And we'd like to win at least one stage of course... just looked it up... it was 1 in 2018, 4 in 2019, 2 in 2020 and 4 in 2021. So yes, one stage win in 2022 would be nice.

[flockmastoR]

The 2 monuments winning teams are the nicest
If I add all of my previous teams I make it to 3, but the nicest was the first one here too, but mostly because Schrödinger was the top favorite and big pressure on the team.