TheManxMissile wrote:
Cobbles Startlist deadline are approaching! Everyone has been PM'd (yesterday) so there are no excuses.
Time to start prepping those Frites and chilling that Bier. Would also recommend digging out the flags and getting the chalk to hand
Come on, if you try to sound Flemish(Dutch actually), do it well...
Frites -> Friet/Patat(Well, not sure if latter one is Flemish at well, I think they only say Friet there)
TheManxMissile wrote:
Cobbles Startlist deadline are approaching! Everyone has been PM'd (yesterday) so there are no excuses.
Time to start prepping those Frites and chilling that Bier. Would also recommend digging out the flags and getting the chalk to hand
Come on, if you try to sound Flemish(Dutch actually), do it well...
Frites -> Friet/Patat(Well, not sure if latter one is Flemish at well, I think they only say Friet there)
Fritten
Isn't it Frieten?
Well, nvm, useless conversation it is
The World Tour goes to Spain! Catalunya is the next stop for the now busy cyclists of the world tour. The spanish race provides an opportunity for those teams who have no interest in the cobbles to pick up points, with a week of climbs and sprints which will surely provide an exciting test.
The race is often used by riders building up to either the Giro or the Ardennes classics, due to it's placing in mid late March. This edition actually see's an unusual route, in that their are many more opportunities for sprinters than in previous seasons.
The Route
No easy start for the riders. We kick off with an "almost-summit" finish. The finish line is actually situated 2km beyond the climb, so there's a small opportunity for distanced riders to get back.
Slightly rising but this should be the first day for the sprinters. The WT calendar this year is lean on flat days, so they'll surely be keen not to let this opportunity slip by!
Stage 3 is another for the GC men. The final climb of the day is followed by a steep descent, and it'll be a stage which belongs to the brave, a good downhill rider could take serious time on the technical final descent.
A similar finish to yesterday, with a long steep descent to the line following 2 selective climbs. at 145km, this stage could see some explosive attacks!
Another day for the sprinters on the 5th stage in Spain. Short and flat is the order of the day, so expect a high paced day with a bunch gallop for the line.
Stage 6 presents one last opportunity for the GC men to throw the dice. A summit finish on the Coll de la Cruetta (18.9km 5.9%) is a serious test for any rider, and will surely see some break ups in the fight for the leaders jersey.
Classed as flat, the 174km ride into Barcelona could be a challenging day ius the riders choose to make it hard. 8laps of a 16km circuit over a small climb will take it's toll on the sprinters legs, and could even see a successful attack if the group is right.
The Starters...
Well now we've seen the route it's time to turn the eyes towards those riders making the journey to Spain, looking to fight it out for individual honours as the classics are getting into the full swing in Belgium.
Several big GC names arrive in Catalunya, though without doubt the big surprise of the race is the lack of sprinting talent. Only 2 frontline sprinters make the journey, other than that we see a list of "second-level" sprinters who will find it difficult to breach the top2.
The overall favourite coming into this race has to be the Spaniard Samuel Sánchez. His team have already had success recently with Purito taking the Paris-Nice, and the German team Allianz is clearly here with victory in mind once again.
His biggest rivals will be Dutch Star Mathis Ruijter who also travels with a superstar lineup, and Haiaers Van den Broeck. Either could topple the Spaniard if their form is good, but it won't be an easy thing to do.
Name
Nationality
Team
Mo
Acc
DH
L.L.Sánchez
TCS Rabobank
75
76
81
J.Geisinger
Motorex - Credit Suisse
78
73
69
D.Moreno
Caterham - Austar
77
77
70
We see one of the wildcard teams leaders making into the lower tier favourites. L.L Sánchez makes it in mostly due to his ability to threaten on thos stages with the DH finish, though he may struggle when the finish is atop a summit.
Geisinger leads a split Motorex team. The swiss side are more focussed on belgium, though their leader is strong and more than capable of a good result here. Moreno and Pinot share the honours of leader for Spanish-English side Caterham Austar. Either could be a threat, but of the two I think Moreno is more likely to challenge overall.
3 riders who should all aim for a top10 or better. Basso is in the twilight of a sparkling career, whilst Henao is kicking off a career which could be equally filled with success. The final man in the 9 GC favourites is Irish born Nicholas Roche. After several years with the old AG2R team he has made his way into a leaders role with Danish - Irish squad Tulip - Guinness. He'll surely be looking to kick off his new opportunity with success here.
The Favourites - Points
Name
Nationality
Team
SP
ACC
Hill
M.Kittel
SGL - Magix
81
81
64
J.Veenhof
ING - InBev
79
78
72
D.Napolitano
ITV Procycling
76
75
64
Only 2 riders here could really be classed as top sprinters, Kittel of SGL-Magix and Veenhof of ING-InBev. The two look set for a big fight for the points and stage honours, whilst Napolitano sneaks onto the list as "best of the rest"
Racing will kick off either tonight or tomorrow morning. Good luck to all!
Another great preview! As you can see at my lineup, this is a "every point is a point won" team. I'm expecting Allianz to continue their winning streak.
Hmm, it was a smart idea to send both my custom riders. Johan can take his first win of the season here, he can really do that
Ruiter(Mathijs Ruiter, not Mathis Ruijter )is the best climber at the start here, but has worse backup stats. Continuing the massive points gaining for me, maybe?
You guys i know this is really early but I would like the startlists for Amgen TOC, the reason for this is that Im going to France beginning of June and I dont ahev PCM there, however there is no deadline, but the reason I ask for this so early is that I dont know how much time I will have in the next weeks
you guys I think this is getting ridiculous, TMM dude just send the Startlist to someone who can report the races, also we should be colecting startlists much earlyer, so while the race before is being posted yo can start the next race, but you dont have to post the race, until the race before it on the Calendar is over. Sorry I'm really tired of constant waiting for races and with a many people as we have in the league, we should be able to report pretty fast
Wow, slow down a bit. We should consider ourselves lucky that there are people willing to spend some of their time to report races. If people are in the hospital or have exams, you can't expect them to report daily.
That being said, I think the thing we can speed up on is the startlist gathering, no need to wait till the previous race is finished to start the new one. The startlists of the races currently running or about to start could've been asked halfway Paris-Nice orsomething. Similarly, I think it would be good for the speed of the game that the startlists of Pais Vasco, GP Indurain and Scheldeprijs are being collected soon(ish).
As said before, I'm ok to help people out with this when needed.
maxime86 wrote:
you guys I think this is getting ridiculous, TMM dude just send the Startlist to someone who can report the races, also we should be colecting startlists much earlyer, so while the race before is being posted yo can start the next race, but you dont have to post the race, until the race before it on the Calendar is over. Sorry I'm really tired of constant waiting for races and with a many people as we have in the league, we should be able to report pretty fast
Yeah i have a life which includes many more important things that running this game, reporting race and Daily in general. All the reporters know what races they have and will get through them when they can whilst keeping some rough chronological order.
In the end people will only report when they can and if you don't like it, well suck it up and deal with it. Posts like that are not going to make anyone go any quicker.
I am also not going to pass on doing the races to anyone else when i have them all set up and all i need is to find a few hours in which i can do them. I only have one exam left then i am done with Uni until October! And from Saturday i am done with my job interviews so will be free at least until the start of July. So have some patientce and the races will come.
Of course i don't know about other people but i imagine they do have valid reasons for any delays. Baggie is still recovering from his crash and will report when he feels up to it. Marco is cracking on with the Crit Int right now, and when that finishes the next race will start.
Also i would not make complaints about time (this is a general point) until you managers get all your startlists in within 24hours of asking. I didn't even receive all the cobbles lists inside the deadline! I also know that some managers work on a race by race basis for sorting their startlists out. I was going to make up an excel sheet for everyone to plan out their seasons so everything was in one place and would be easily accessible by reporters, but i didn't/don't have time to put in that much effort for this Beta season. Later in the season (especially over the summer months) we will become a lot more organized and smooth in running this but i can safely say that none of us have done anything like this before. Be thankful we've got this far, which is a lot further most other games, and soon to become the longest run game (outside of the Man-Game).
Can't deal with it, then i recommend starting your own game and running it perfectly straight away. If you do that then i'll listen but frankly i don't care. I've probably put a hundred hours or more into this game since i put the idea forward back in November/December (can't remember when) and sorry if that is not good enough for you and that i need to put real life first for a couple of weeks.
I know this is a long post and very much a rant, but it needs to be said. I am almost constantly it seems having some criticism or complaint or something fired at me, the game or the people who help run it. And i am sick of it. These things do not help me want to put the effort in. I was about to start writing up a preview for the cobbled classics when i saw your comment, but now i don't have the motivation to bother, so that gets knocked back until next week. Thanks again.
I agree with you TMM.
It's not like UCPCL is your job, and it shouldn't feel like it either
We should do this together, as a community. Maxime, you should calm down, there are other things in life than the UCPCL
maxime86 wrote:
you guys I think this is getting ridiculous, TMM dude just send the Startlist to someone who can report the races, also we should be colecting startlists much earlyer, so while the race before is being posted yo can start the next race, but you dont have to post the race, until the race before it on the Calendar is over. Sorry I'm really tired of constant waiting for races and with a many people as we have in the league, we should be able to report pretty fast
Yeah i have a life which includes many more important things that running this game, reporting race and Daily in general. All the reporters know what races they have and will get through them when they can whilst keeping some rough chronological order.
In the end people will only report when they can and if you don't like it, well suck it up and deal with it. Posts like that are not going to make anyone go any quicker.
I am also not going to pass on doing the races to anyone else when i have them all set up and all i need is to find a few hours in which i can do them. I only have one exam left then i am done with Uni until October! And from Saturday i am done with my job interviews so will be free at least until the start of July. So have some patientce and the races will come.
Of course i don't know about other people but i imagine they do have valid reasons for any delays. Baggie is still recovering from his crash and will report when he feels up to it. Marco is cracking on with the Crit Int right now, and when that finishes the next race will start.
Also i would not make complaints about time (this is a general point) until you managers get all your startlists in within 24hours of asking. I didn't even receive all the cobbles lists inside the deadline! I also know that some managers work on a race by race basis for sorting their startlists out. I was going to make up an excel sheet for everyone to plan out their seasons so everything was in one place and would be easily accessible by reporters, but i didn't/don't have time to put in that much effort for this Beta season. Later in the season (especially over the summer months) we will become a lot more organized and smooth in running this but i can safely say that none of us have done anything like this before. Be thankful we've got this far, which is a lot further most other games, and soon to become the longest run game (outside of the Man-Game).
Can't deal with it, then i recommend starting your own game and running it perfectly straight away. If you do that then i'll listen but frankly i don't care. I've probably put a hundred hours or more into this game since i put the idea forward back in November/December (can't remember when) and sorry if that is not good enough for you and that i need to put real life first for a couple of weeks.
I know this is a long post and very much a rant, but it needs to be said. I am almost constantly it seems having some criticism or complaint or something fired at me, the game or the people who help run it. And i am sick of it. These things do not help me want to put the effort in. I was about to start writing up a preview for the cobbled classics when i saw your comment, but now i don't have the motivation to bother, so that gets knocked back until next week. Thanks again.
Instead of that post you could have written a report.
Spoiler
Just kidding, I think we all understand the situation
