Hey, you had fun, didn’t you? In the beginning at least?
Yes, the season is over and we are deep into the process of looking back and trying to understand what happened. We had some outstanding individual performances, capped by Remco Evenepoel (selected by voters) and Annemiek van Vleuten (vote unnecessary) as our top performing riders of the year. We could get into a debate about which teams were superior in 2022 (it was Jumbo men and Trek women).
Or we could begin three months of gnashing our teeth over our FSA Directeur Sportif teams.
Yes, let’s do that. But first… let’s congratulate the godverdo… the noble winners of the 2022 FSA DS! As we sometimes discussed along the way, it was a fascinating competition, with the usual twists and turns among the top riders and our share of shocking improvements and disappointments. It’s a time to reflect not just on what the top teams did but on your own results and strategies. Let’s dive in!
Photo by Dario Belingheri/Getty Images,
Men’s Teams
Sigh…
Well before getting to the top teams, let’s just say that our year-long pricing conversation, which I defended until I couldn’t, has officially blown up in my face. The Men’s competition was more or less dominated by teams who selected Tadej Pogačar, thanks to his last-month blitz that separated him from the pack and made his 30-point price a bit too cheap. That won’t be happening again.
But if you look at the winners… well, let’s introduce them.
In first place is Effort Curseur 99, helmed by Elpedacyclo, who rose from the bottom to the top in just three years of playing the FSA DS. Elpeda won by some 900 points, a pretty solid win after two years of close competition. Effort Curseur 99 rose on the backs of not just Pogačar but fully 11 riders scoring in excess of 1000 points, seven of which were single-digit cost pickups. That’s a lot of value! Not sure if it’s entirely apples-to-apples but his final score of 27,700 is the greatest season in FSA DS history!
[Actually all of the top six teams beat the previous scoring record. Just one of those years.]
Second place went to Greylock and Team BoPenYang, also boasting 11 1000+ scorers, six of whom were single-digit priced. Greylock has been well above average for several seasons but this is their…
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