Jayco-AlUla surge out of the bottom four whilst Arkéa and AG2R slide | May Report

In a month dominated by the Giro d'Italia, Jayco-AlUla have managed to overhaul a 777.14 point deficit on relegation rivals, Arkéa Samsic, to move out of the relegation zone and build an impressive lead of over 1000 points. Thanks to - in part - the new UCI points system, the first Grand Tour of the season has significantly altered the dynamics of the UCI Rankings. In this article, we analyse the latest developments in the relegation battle; Lotto-Dstny's successful Giro Alternative calendar and Groupama-FDJ's fruitful month on the roads of France and Italy. First, though, let's remind ourselves of how the UCI Rankings has changed since the end of April.

This graph visualises the positional changes in the UCI Rankings since our last report, at the end of April. Although the top three remain the same, the graph illustrates a successful May for Bahrain-Victorious and Groupama-FDJ, who have managed to break into the top 5 following strong GC results at the Giro d'Italia - which increased their tally by over 350 points. Towards the bottom, Israel-Premier Tech and Jayco-AlUla made significant progress, with both teams moving up. The losers, therefore, were AG2R Citroën and Arkéa Samsic, who dropped into the bottom four following a dismal month - which saw them score the least out of any WorldTour team. The graph below displays a full breakdown of the points accumulated by our 22 tracked teams this month, divided between the Giro and the Giro Alternative.

Despite losing out on the Maglia Rosa, INEOS Grenadiers were quite clearly the best team of the Giro - and the best team this May - accumulating nearly 800 points more than second placed UAE Team Emirates, who still lead the UCI Rankings. Notably, Groupama-FDJ managed to gain more points than Jumbo-Visma, who gained 1100 of their points through Primož Roglič's Giro victory. As the graph illustrates, this is partially due to their participation in the Giro Alternative, (by hovering over the pink or blue sections, you can see the exact points gained in both the Giro and Giro Alternative) where they gained 40% of their points - the second largest proportion for any team that competed at the Giro. Through their participation of mostly French Cup races, Groupama picked up 4 wins, including the GC at the Four Days of Dunkerque. Alone, Pinot & co.'s points would have been enough for 11th place in the May Rankings. However, with the Giro Alternative supplement, this has enabled Groupama to move into 5th place in the overall rankings, displacing Trek-Segafredo and Soudal-Quick Step.

The most successful exponents of the Giro Alternative, though, was Lotto-Dstny, who came 9th in the May Rankings despite not attending the Giro. After injuries sustained at the Four Days of Dunkerque ruled De Lie out of any further racing in the Giro Alternative, Lotto relied on Ewan, Vermeersch, Menten and van Eetvelt to score the majority of their points. Indeed, they accounted for nearly 70% of their month's total. Despite only picking up two victories, the volume of races Lotto competed in (and thus the available points) combined with consistent top 10s enabled the Belgian squad to maximise their race day to point ratio, since they did not attend the Giro. Rather than compete in the 'high quality' Giro d'Italia with no real GC rider and sprint/breakaway stages their only chance of success, they attended more race days suited to their squad composition by attending almost every Giro Alternative race. Consequently, Lotto's ProTour team status has enabled them to replicate Alpecin-Deceuninck's strategy from the last cycle, whereby they registered WorldTour quality teams for smaller races, increasing the likelihood of multiple riders finishing in high scoring positions (they even sent van Eetvelt to a 2.2 race with their development team, which amounted to 55 points). Whilst the new points system places greater significance on Grand Tours and WorldTour races, 'packing the calendar' with lower quality, 'training' races has allowed Lotto to maintain their 10th position overall and maximise their points to race day ratio. Teams such as Jayco-AlUla and Astana-Qazaqstan - who register for the lowest number of races out of teams around the bottom - should take note of Lotto's strategy, since it will be harder to catch up in the last years of the cycle because every team will be adopting a points-focused strategy.

This graph shows the development of the relegation battle so far. Aided by the new points system which provides a greater appreciation of stage results at Grand Tours, Israel-Premier Tech were the highest scorers out of the teams at the bottom, scoring 1802 points. Since the top 15 of each stage are now rewarded - instead of the top 5 - stage-hunting teams at Grand Tours are disproportionately benefitting from the new points system, meaning that targeting consistent stage results provides more points than finishing just outside the top 10 overall. Such lessons should be heeded by teams as we progress through this cycle, as it would be unwise for teams targeting points to solely approach a Grand Tour with a GC focus.

As we discussed in our Giro Report, Jayco-AlUla made significant progress in the relegation battle, turning a 777.14 point deficit into a 1045.18 point lead. The graph below breaks down the points accumulated by the Australian outfit this month.

Since Jayco only competed in three other races aside from the Giro, this graph unsurprisingly illustrates that Jayco scored 90% of their points in Italy. Amalgamated with O'Brien's top 10 in Köln and Groenewegen's success in Hungary and Veenendaal, Jayco enjoyed, by far, their best month of the season, adding 1778 points.

Although the same can be said of AG2R, they failed to pick up a similar number of points to rivals Jayco, IPT and DSM - who all attained over 250 points more. Despite taking a stage victory, the French outfit only amassed 592 points at the Giro and, although Van Avermaet scored 125 points courtesy of his victory at Boucles de l'Aulne - Châteaulin, they have slid from 15th to 17th. Prior to Gall's second place yesterday at the Mercan'Tour Classic, they were 18th, highlighting the severity of their situation. That said, they still lead 19th placed Arkéa Samsic by over 1100 points and with a strong preliminary TDF line up, including O'Connor, Gall and Peters, they should have the quality to move up numerous positions in the coming months.

The same cannot be said of Arkéa Samsic, who had a dismal month. Attaining a mere 704 points, they dropped into the bottom four and look unlikely to move out, given their poor performances in the Giro and Giro Alternative. In the last cycle, Arkéa were one of the largest beneficiaries of the disproportionately weighted points system. Now, with greater emphasis placed on WorldTour races - and the departure of Nairo Quintana - they have started to rapidly lose ground to their rivals since Vauquelin and Barguil are their only major point sources in mountainous races. The lost ground is not through a lack of trying, though, as they have a busy calendar which attempts to maximise their points to race day ratio, although optimisation is harder as a WorldTour team because teams cannot opt out of races unsuited to their squad composition. With races such as Giro dell'Appennino, Heylen Vastgoed Heistse Pijl, Elfstedenronde Brugge and La Route d'Occitanie, they should be able to cut the gap to Jayco-AlUla, who are registered for 50% less races than them.

Whisper it quietly, but down at the very bottom, Astana-Qazaqstan have started to improve, picking up 915 points this month (they even moved above Uno-X at one stage!). Although their program is far from conducive to rectify their 2,289.02 point gap to safety, the next month should tell us whether Lutsenko and De La Cruz have the potential to take a stage win at the Tour in July, which is worth 210 points.

The next month brings a multitude of different preparation races for the Tour, including the Critérium du Dauphiné, Tour de Suisse and Tour of Slovenia. Alongside these preparation races, there are a number of small one day races in Belgium, France and Switzerland, with 125 points awarded to the winner of each.