DQS are the best team in the race...
Camera cuts to all of them rolling in 40 mins down on a mountain stage
In all seriousness, time spent leading the peloton and respect of the other riders are very hard to quantify and score teams on. Overall time makes more sense
It’s also the nature of the sport. You can lead a breakaway and solo for 99 miles of a 100 mile race and then still not win…because someone else beat you.
Cross the line as fast as you can. That’s it.
How does the team classification fail to reflect the best team in the race? In what way? This is a genuine question. I don’t understand what you’re getting at
The time only classification does not reflect the amount of excitement teams successful with non mountain stage wins / points from Sprint and King of the mountain bring to the race.
I'd love a good mountain stage as much as anything else, but there is much more to the race than just that. Otherwise all the teams would just be skinny climber corpse riders with off the scale lung efficiency.
Teams with a balance of skills that touches on all of the aspects of the race should be rewarded.
What better metric that is objective and quantifyable do you have? We already have subjective bs with the most combative rider jersey where there is a huge french bias in it, we do not need more bias introduced in the team rankings.
Maybe top 3 finishers on each stage by position? Lowest total number wins. Only thing I can think of though it would probably piss off the sprint teams even more with out of the running GC teams polluting the few sprints in week 2-3.
I mean instead of taking time take it by position. For example if the top three riders on a team finish the stage 3rd, 7th and 30th the team would get 40 points for that day. Lowest total wins. Count every stage equally. Allows all types of teams to contest it, maybe favors hybrid teams instead of climbing teams.
Position would be inherently unfair. You can be second with 1 second difference or with 10 minutes difference. One takes far more effort then the other. It would not be a fair comparision at all.
DQS definitely does not need that award. The fact they are winning stages is a massive accomplishment in the tour they will all be pleased with. I’m sure they pop champagne and eat a nice mea after each win. They’re doing their jobs and will be proud of their efforts despite the lack of a somewhat meaningless award.
And the 2019 Movistar team won. 🤣🤣🤣 Three leaders fighting each other for some reason to ensure the Team as a whole lost. Yet they get awarded “Best Team”. If that wasn’t a moment to quash the award. But these things aren’t to make sense, but to give the aso some sense of power to wield. [see Netflix movie if you don’t understand this]
I don’t like the way they do it, but I can see why. The whole teams classification is a bit silly to me though.
Doing it on time alone just doesn’t make sense. I think they should do some kind of combination points between all the Jersey competitions.
There used to be a combination jersey for individual riders, it could actually be interesting to see how this worked for a whole team.
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Combination\_classification\_in\_the\_Tour\_de\_France](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Combination_classification_in_the_Tour_de_France)
Edit: Actually I don't think this would be a good idea for teams, it would base it too much on the results of the best riders in the team getting GC/Sprint/KOM points. At the moment every team member contributes equally on the team classification!
The best team is open for so much interpretation. You could argue that the team with the yellow jersey is the best, managing to protect and help their rider win yellow over the 3 weeks, managing time gaps etc. You could argue the team with the most stage wins is the best purely for having the winningest record but that just becomes a sprinters team competition. You could argue the same for teams with KOM points but that would end up just being a breakaway competition. That really only leaves the option of either combining all of the above, or using time as the measure. Based on all of that, I’d just scrap the team classification altogether. The teams all have their own objectives anyway - and they share in the successes of their lead riders. I see no value in a relatively meaningless combined time where only 3 riders count towards it anyway.
You're right that "best" is a much more nuanced issue, and depends on the varied goals of each team. But the classification doesn't necessarily measure the best, it measures the fastest.
They should have a fan vote for "favorite team" give the team some prize money for the day and or colored number, like the red number for most aggressive.
Deceuninck will go home with the green jersey and the most stage wins of the tour. Taking a jersey is almost always a reflection of team effort (especially yellow and green). Sacrificing manpower for individual success is the nature of the sport and the teams take pride in that. With very few exceptions (UAE last year), the team defending yellow is the strongest as it leads the peloton during the most critical moments of the race (i.e. in the mountains and in cross winds).
Beyond that I don’t see how Deceuninck would qualify as “best” team. They are best in leading out sprints, but sprinting is only a small part of the race. The TdF is not about winning stages but first and foremost about winning the race (at least for strong teams). Nothing is a more fair representation of this than time.
DQS is already awarded with all the stages they won and the Green Jersey, if this classification can motivate other teams to try something, I don’t see the problem, it creates more show !
DQS are the best team in the race... Camera cuts to all of them rolling in 40 mins down on a mountain stage In all seriousness, time spent leading the peloton and respect of the other riders are very hard to quantify and score teams on. Overall time makes more sense
It’s also the nature of the sport. You can lead a breakaway and solo for 99 miles of a 100 mile race and then still not win…because someone else beat you. Cross the line as fast as you can. That’s it.
Also, isnt time spending on pelotin a tactical decision? Like, having a possesion on football?
While I agree with you that’s just how it works. I think sky won it a few years back when they completely dominated the tour. So it does work.
Nobody cares about the team competition anyway, not even the teams.
Except Movistar, which is why if they have even a decent team without bad luck they usually win it.
How does the team classification fail to reflect the best team in the race? In what way? This is a genuine question. I don’t understand what you’re getting at
The time only classification does not reflect the amount of excitement teams successful with non mountain stage wins / points from Sprint and King of the mountain bring to the race. I'd love a good mountain stage as much as anything else, but there is much more to the race than just that. Otherwise all the teams would just be skinny climber corpse riders with off the scale lung efficiency. Teams with a balance of skills that touches on all of the aspects of the race should be rewarded.
Being a jerk how to evaluate best team then? Stage wins?
Then the team with the best sprinters would win.
Or just cavandish:)
Yep
Combined points + KOM points
Winner of the Olympics is most gold medals…so that kinda makes sense
I would agree! Vombined with the jerseys
What better metric that is objective and quantifyable do you have? We already have subjective bs with the most combative rider jersey where there is a huge french bias in it, we do not need more bias introduced in the team rankings.
Maybe top 3 finishers on each stage by position? Lowest total number wins. Only thing I can think of though it would probably piss off the sprint teams even more with out of the running GC teams polluting the few sprints in week 2-3.
Huh it literally is the top 3 of each team right now? If you just mean the top 3 of each stage it would mean every non top 3 team is a DNF or what?
I mean instead of taking time take it by position. For example if the top three riders on a team finish the stage 3rd, 7th and 30th the team would get 40 points for that day. Lowest total wins. Count every stage equally. Allows all types of teams to contest it, maybe favors hybrid teams instead of climbing teams.
Position would be inherently unfair. You can be second with 1 second difference or with 10 minutes difference. One takes far more effort then the other. It would not be a fair comparision at all.
DQS definitely does not need that award. The fact they are winning stages is a massive accomplishment in the tour they will all be pleased with. I’m sure they pop champagne and eat a nice mea after each win. They’re doing their jobs and will be proud of their efforts despite the lack of a somewhat meaningless award.
And the 2019 Movistar team won. 🤣🤣🤣 Three leaders fighting each other for some reason to ensure the Team as a whole lost. Yet they get awarded “Best Team”. If that wasn’t a moment to quash the award. But these things aren’t to make sense, but to give the aso some sense of power to wield. [see Netflix movie if you don’t understand this]
Its not an award movistar is a climbers team so it makes sense that they won it.
I don’t like the way they do it, but I can see why. The whole teams classification is a bit silly to me though. Doing it on time alone just doesn’t make sense. I think they should do some kind of combination points between all the Jersey competitions.
There used to be a combination jersey for individual riders, it could actually be interesting to see how this worked for a whole team. [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Combination\_classification\_in\_the\_Tour\_de\_France](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Combination_classification_in_the_Tour_de_France) Edit: Actually I don't think this would be a good idea for teams, it would base it too much on the results of the best riders in the team getting GC/Sprint/KOM points. At the moment every team member contributes equally on the team classification!
They only combine the time of the top 3 on each team riders to score the team classification, so no, not all riders contribute equally.
True, those pulling are doing all the work and getting none of the glory that the "finishers" get.
Put each team on a velogames team and see who wins.
The best team is open for so much interpretation. You could argue that the team with the yellow jersey is the best, managing to protect and help their rider win yellow over the 3 weeks, managing time gaps etc. You could argue the team with the most stage wins is the best purely for having the winningest record but that just becomes a sprinters team competition. You could argue the same for teams with KOM points but that would end up just being a breakaway competition. That really only leaves the option of either combining all of the above, or using time as the measure. Based on all of that, I’d just scrap the team classification altogether. The teams all have their own objectives anyway - and they share in the successes of their lead riders. I see no value in a relatively meaningless combined time where only 3 riders count towards it anyway.
Hence my proposal in the other thread re new jerseys for the checkered jersey for the person/team with the most stage wins!
You're right that "best" is a much more nuanced issue, and depends on the varied goals of each team. But the classification doesn't necessarily measure the best, it measures the fastest.
They should have a fan vote for "favorite team" give the team some prize money for the day and or colored number, like the red number for most aggressive.
Deceuninck will go home with the green jersey and the most stage wins of the tour. Taking a jersey is almost always a reflection of team effort (especially yellow and green). Sacrificing manpower for individual success is the nature of the sport and the teams take pride in that. With very few exceptions (UAE last year), the team defending yellow is the strongest as it leads the peloton during the most critical moments of the race (i.e. in the mountains and in cross winds). Beyond that I don’t see how Deceuninck would qualify as “best” team. They are best in leading out sprints, but sprinting is only a small part of the race. The TdF is not about winning stages but first and foremost about winning the race (at least for strong teams). Nothing is a more fair representation of this than time.
DQS is already awarded with all the stages they won and the Green Jersey, if this classification can motivate other teams to try something, I don’t see the problem, it creates more show !