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WorldTour Relegation Battle: This year the fight for UCI points is more important than before, only the top eighteen teams will get WorldTour licenses. Lotto Soudal is on the wrong side of that divide and the overall win in the Baloise Belgium Tour could have made a difference. We look at the UCI WorldTour ‘league’ and where the teams are at the moment.
Tim Wellens and Campenaerts did what they could – Those 50 points would have been handy
In the Baloise Belgium Tour last weekend, Yves Lampaert was disqualified after he deliberately hindered Tim Wellens during the Golden Kilometre, preventing the Lotto Soudal rider from collecting bonus seconds. Wellens finished on the same time as Lampaert’s teammate Mauro Schmid, but the Swiss rider was better in the time trial by hundredths of a second and so a beat Wellens in the final overall result. This result also affects the UCI WorldTour promotion and relegation position as Lotto would have scored an extra 50 points for the win.
Lampaert getting in the way of Wellens
At the end of this year there will be promotion and relegation in the WorldTour based on the total number of points that WorldTour teams and ProTeams have collected in the last three seasons – 2020, 2021 and 2022. The top eighteen teams will receive a WorldTour license for the 2023, 2024 and 2025 seasons, if they want and pass the other criteria.
Mauro Schmid thanks his teammates
Good work by Lotto Soudal, but not enough
Andreas Kron took 40 UCI points and Sylvain Moniquet 20, which was a contribution to Lotto Soudal’s points total. But at the Baloise Belgium Tour Victor Campenaerts took 85 points and Wellens gained 165 points in total. Lotto Soudal is now the nineteenth team in the UCI standings at 0.33 points bellow BikeExchange-Jayco who have 12629,33 points, but they are in the top 18.
Aleksandr Vlasov and Sergio Higuita collecting the points for BORA-hansgrohe
BORA-hansgrohe doing well
The best scoring team of last week was BORA-hansgrohe. Danny van Poppel added 10 points with a second place on the second stage of the Tour of Belgium. The most points came from the Tour de Suisse. Aleksandr Vlasov won a stage and held the leader’s jersey, taking 70 points. However, Vlasov had to abandon after a positive covid test. But Higuita was second in the general classification and had one day in the leader’s jersey, this was worth 410 points, Felix Großschartner was sixth, 150 points and Maximilian Schachmann was tenth and second in the opening stage, 110 points.
Ruben Guerreiro helping EF Education-EasyPost stay in the WorldTour with his win in the Mont Ventoux Dénivilé Challenge
EF also scored points as did Israel-Premier Tech
EF Education-EasyPost also had a good week. The American team has been the same number of points most of the season, but last week it showed some movement. After a good Critérium du Dauphiné, Ruben Guerreiro and Esteban Chaves were first and second in the Mont Ventoux Dénivilé Challenge, good for 210 UCI points. Simon Carr finished sixteenth, adding 3 points. Michael Valgren then took 5 points with a second place in a stage of La Route d’Occitanie, but then crashed out. They took more points in the Tour de Suisse. Alberto Bettiol finished second on one stage, which was good for 25 points. Neilson Powless was second on the stage won by Vlasov in Novazzano and climbed to fourth place overall, collected a total of 300 points.
Matthews and Fuglsang doing their bit for BikeExchange-Jayco and Israel Premier Tech
The relegation fight
At the bottom the fight goes on and it is close. Lotto Soudal, Israel-Premier Tech, EF Education-EasyPost, BikeExchange-Jayco, Movistar and Cofidis are very close, with 1200 points separating Cofidis and Israel-Premier Tech. The Israeli team are the worst placed of the WorldTour teams, but had a good week. Jakob Fuglsang was third in the Tour de Suisse and took 345 points and Michael Woods won La Route d’Occitanie, gaining 142 points. Also Sep Vanmarcke was fifteenth in Baloise Belgium Tour, Daryl Impey had a stage win in Switzerland, Hugo Houle was fifteenth in Switzerland and Carl Frederik Hagen was fourteenth in Occitanie, this all helped, but they need a lot more good weeks to save their WorldTour status.
Israel-Premier Tech need more wins like Daryl Impey’s stage victory in Switzerland
National championships points
This weeks points can be won in the national championships. Winners in the bigger cycling counties receive 100 UCI points for a road title and 50 points for the time trial.
Team points totals for 2020, 2021 & 2022:
1. Jumbo-Visma 31000.67
2. Quick-Step Alpha Vinyl 30679,37
3. INEOS Grenadiers 30121.99
4. UAE Emirates 28122.66
5. Bahrain Victorious 22371
6. BORA-hansgrohe 22005,5
7. Alpecin-Fenix 18596 (ProTeam)
8. Groupama-FDJ 17339
9. Trek-Segafredo 16668.66
10. Intermarché-Wanty-Gobert 15180
11. AG2R Citroën 15157
12. Astana Qazaqstan 14926
13. Arkéa Samsic 14017 (ProTeam)
14. Team DSM 13826.71
15. Cofidis 13351
16. Movistar 13272
17. EF Education-EasyPost 13193.32
18. BikeExchange-Jayco 12629,33
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19. Lotto Soudal 12629
20. Israel-Premier Tech 12142.66
21. TotalEnergies 8409 (ProTeam)
22. Uno-X 6103.46 (ProTeam)
23. B&B Hotels-KTM 5248 (ProTeam)
The top 18 are guaranteed a place in the WorldTour in 2023.
No problem for Jumbo-Visma
# A big thanks to Youri Ijnsen of WielerFlits for the facts and figures. #
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