I usually open this with an evaluation of our performance last year but will skip that as Heine already did a great job here.
Overall last year worked pretty well, although not great that the division it is calibrated against - PCT - was the worst performer.
As before, this is a rider-level projection - each rider is evaluated and then a team is added up. There is no attempt to evaluate team make up except that this year, with a little help from Claude, a factor was added to discount for redundant leaders. I hope this addition isn't accurate because one of the biggest negative impacts was on McCormick.
Also the algorithm was tweaked for 2025 data. with, among other thigs, Stamina assigned a role it didn't have before (no surprise there). But generally this remains an OVL-based formula.
Rankings below, focus is more on the relative versus absolute points. And then a little discussion.
PT
1
King Power
5,840
2
Evonik - ELKO
5,266
3
ELCO - ABEA
4,668
4
Tinkoff - La Datcha Team
4,636
5
Cedevita
4,573
6
Rabobank
4,555
7
Assa Abloy
4,465
8
Polar
4,454
9
Carlsberg - Danske Bank
4,166
10
Hunter Valley Cycling
4,029
11
MOL Cycling Team
3,972
12
Gazelle
3,704
13
Aker - Ab InBev
3,665
14
Indosat Ooredoo
3,615
15
Specialized
3,603
16
Bolt - Eesti
3,490
17
Fastned
3,484
18
DK Zalgiris
3,395
19
Xero Racing
3,362
20
cycleYorkshire
3,119
21
Los Pollos Hermanos
2,104
22
Ekoi - Renault
1,618
PCT
1
Grieg-Maersk
3,359
2
Bralirwa - Cegeka
3,161
3
Jura GIANTS
3,109
4
Sauber Petronas Racing
3,042
5
Lierse SK - Pizza Ullo PCTeam
3,023
6
McCormick Pro Cycling
3,001
7
UBS - EDP
2,888
8
Duvel - Tsingtao
2,658
9
Philips - Hero
2,658
10
Minions
2,650
11
Trans Looney Tunes
2,601
12
Zwift - Newton Foundation
2,588
13
Bacharu Mamachari Faito!
2,550
14
Riders of Rohan
2,392
15
Gjensidige Pro Cycling Team
2,227
16
Everesting
2,173
17
Lotto-Caloi
2,110
18
Tryg - Eni
2,088
19
Ethiopian Airlines
1,964
20
Peugeot
1,945
21
Bianchi Enel
1,838
22
SparkNZ - Liquigas Pro Cycling
1,724
CT
1
Deutsche WindGuard
1,847
2
DeNA RoadStars
1,410
3
JEWA TIROL
1,371
4
Banco Vaticano-Valkyrie
1,348
5
Karthago
1,191
6
SEE Turtles
1,076
7
IESE ProCycling Team
1,067
8
IncaLine Pro Cycling
991
9
Euskotren - Pays Basque
972
10
Simba Cement - Tanga Fresh
964
11
Air New Zealand-Prada
876
12
THE ONE - Fox God
867
13
Fincantieri - Grand Seiko
864
14
Tafjord Kraft
844
15
Parmalat - Croatia
600
16
Brandt Cycling Team
506
17
Billstedt-Horn
289
Generally the results seem in line with other previews.
My system see King Power rising to the top of the heap this year but Evonik staying strong, although a long way back. The relegated teams do pretty well with 7th, 10th, 15th and 16th (and 22nd). Gazelle fairs reasonably well and I was surprised by how low cycleYorkshire was. Gazelle has a lot of third tier guys who might have more value in PCT, on which my system was based, while cycleYorkshirse's weaker riders are very weak so they get no credit. Xero also weak but I think my system undervalues Pidcock (see MvDP below) and there is also some assumed regression to the mean so an outlier scorer like Areruya also suffers in a PCT-based algorithm.
I would have posted this sooner but I saw where Peugeot and Bianchi Enel sat in PCT and I had to go back and look for errors. I did find an error but it didn't impact those teams all that much (Heine's points project also ranks Bianchi very low). Both those managers specialize in identifying value so it is not surprising an OVL-based system would underscore them. MvDP will absolutely score more than I projected because his skill set defies his OVL in a way my formulas don't capture (I am more of a Lapeira sceptic though). Both managers also seem to believe in high sprint, bad back up sprinters, who have relatively low OVLs, so I expect there is some value there. I think both teams will outscore my projections.
At the top oF PCT my system really loves Grieg, the cobblers all get full value. Not only does the system not look at team construction, Claude's calculation of the impact of multiple leaders concluded there was no impact on the cobbles. I am not totally sold on Grieg but I do think #2 and 3, Bralirwa and Jura, are very likely promotees. After that I think there are probably 10 teams in with a shot. all the way down to BMF.
One thing I haven't considered is the reduction to 22 PCT teams, not sure if that impacts anything here.
CT projections are similar to others although less bullish on JEWA. Because the system is calibrated to identify leaders at the PCT level I think Deutsche Windgard's hill stack is not penalized when perhaps it should be. But that is a big gap to 2nd - Kamberaj, Quita and Wisniowski are all excellent CT leaders.
My system has never loved the Turtles, maybe because it distributes the value of TTTs across all TT riders rather than those who have TT friends on the team. This might also undervalue a team like Philips in PCT. My system also likes Tafjord less than other previews, it hates Pira (he is projected to score 0, which is probably a little harsh).
I didn't show the dev teams but if I had the best one, Le Creuset, would be on 30 points.
Well I’d be happy with that! Not sure we have the top end to really threaten for promotion, but who knows what the PCM engine will do, and at least we’ve not been caught out by huge investment in areas with incredible competition (MTs/CBs). Still think Benoot will dominate some of his races which isn’t necessarily a ‘wild card’ but is nonetheless our ticket to the big time.
Agree with your assessment that like last season, any team in the top 14 or so could have a shot if the chips fall the right way.
I think the projections speak well to how close the PCT division is this year. 160 points between 2 and 6, 108 between 8 and 13, and not even that much between those two groups either. I think independent of exact accuracy team by team, we can expect a very tight season. Would be very happy of course if the accuracy for my team in particular was correct
Thank you for doing these again! And also for getting into some of the parameters and what might lead to teams like Peugeot and Bianchi to be undervalued. Very interesting!
Thanks for sharing your thoughts and estimates. Uplifting for us but rather optimistic I'm afraid. Curious to see Bianchi and Peugeut both in relegation zone, which is something I wouldn't expect at first sight, but you've explained it well enough. It should be enough of an outlier to doom us in the end unfortunately.
Another projection seeing us in the promotion region, guess I'm the only one left arguing that it could go rather wrong as well But would obviously take that any day!
I hope to overperform your prediction, even though it scares me as it is a possibility. Ranaweera and APP did very well for Ekoi last year, what if I can't get them to repeat that and they do much worse? What if my belieif in Coquard fails?
Since this is a math based projection there isn't a whole lot to poke holes in. But your projection had my team 12th last year which was decent. Not sure which changes in the algorithm suddenly puts me in 5th when my team is mostly the same.
hope that isn’t true
