A mere one week before the awarding of the post-Classics prize, Jered's stranglehold on the maglia tecnicolore has finally been broken. Taking his place is The Saint, by some 60-odd points, while Jiggs, Bob, Sarah and McLovin (among others) are all hot on the heels. A few brief notes/reminders:
- The Tour de Georgia is NOT a VDS race. Participation issues...
- Prizes: from the schwag box... actually there is some really cool stuff in there. But I don't think we can swing a woolie, unless someone wants to make a specific donation.
- Along the same lines, the Scheldeprijs IS a VDS race, despite similarly poor participation. Future use of it is debatable, but for now what's done is done.
- Another topic for next year: should Amstel really be scored differently than Liege? "Monument" is a powerful label, but if you look at yesterday's race, it was every bit as competitive as a typical Liege. Anyway, that's for later.
For now, let's look at the key Ardennes guys on each of the top 6 teams:
The Saint: Valverde, Rebellin, Schleck, Nocentini, Pineau.
Bike Game: Bettini, Gesink, Haussler, Bozic.
Thousand Islanders: Cunego, Sam-San (?), Kroon, Haussler.
South Berkeley Flahutes: Dekker, Nocentini, Haussler.
Gunners: Dekker, Carlstrom, Pfannenberger, Haussler.
Lactic Euphoria: Dekker, Gesink, Schleck.
Conclusion? The Saint will be tough to beat, though Jiggs can do it if Cunego goes berserk, and the bottom three on this list will go as far as Thomas Dekker takes them. The Bike Game is toast. Lactic Euphoria could easily rise up to second with Schleck (though the Saint has him too). Pretty exciting stuff!
Update [2008-4-21 16:29:16 by chris]: Spreadsheets updated.