MAY 2020

[luques]

http://www.cycling4freaks.com/radsport/may2020.pdf

Needs to be designed.

Dauphine 2020

[Robyklebt]

The questions are:

-Giro 4-5?
-Dunkerque? 2020 profiles only the start-finish to be found on their site. No profiles. We didn't ride it 2019 it seems, so doing that could be an option.
-Norway, same as Dunkerque, nothing useful on their site. Some summer fantasy stage race we never rode would be my proposal. I think OL still has some designed that were never used.

[Gipfelstuermer]

Tough call for the Giro. Normally 4 editions with 19-22 in the evening is well balanced, because I think people who prefer 18h can normally ride 19h and who prefers 23h can normally ride 22h. People with favorite time 20/21 can also normally be OK with 19 or 22. But would be interesting to hear if anybody plans to ride the Giro and cannot ride with the proposed times? That would open the case for 5 editions. Somebody speaks up?

The other hard-to-predict thing is total participation. Last year we had 59 teams riding 5 editions (9-15-18-20-22) with 10 each except that 22h had 19 teams. The 22h edition destroyed the financials for some players due to the imbalance in the game that the higher the number of players the lower is the average profit per team. That was clearly not good and maybe led to less participation in Le Tour and Vuelta subsequently. This year we might have less players (fantasy Giro, bugs, no new features) or actually more players (lockdown, those who ride regularly, normally ride the GTs). With 19-22 the financial imbalance is also not so much for the 22h people but for 19h and 22h. Can expect two large fields there, with a very small probability even two fields possible. (Two fields would be bad. Then 5 editions probably the better choice)

On the other hand, large pelotons are fun. Vuelta was only 4 editions and ok.

On Dunkerque, Norway, Dauphine: Can somebody comment who does not ride Giro? I don't really have an opinion other than we should try to have an acceptable parallel programme for those who cannot ride 3 weeks of a Grand Tours. Acceptable also means not too many editions so that they have sensible peloton sizes.

[CircleCycle]

It is maybe early but as it seems both tours are fantasy anyway I ask just right away…
Giro and Dauphine are overlapping by one day. Normally in June you had the decision to ride Dauphine or Tour de Suisse, now if you ride the Giro no decision anymore.
So would it be possible to change the dates for Dauphine?

[Gipfelstuermer]

So would it be possible to change the dates for Dauphine?

Never too early to discuss calendar and currently Dauphine planned for May so correct timing.

Original dates were:
Sa, 9 May - Su, 31 May: GIRO
Su, 31 May - Su, 7 June: DAUPHINE
Sa, 6 June - Su, 14 June: TOUR DE SUISSE
Sa, 27 June - Su, 19 July: LE TOUR

All of them will be fantasy, yes. The time between TDS and TDF was planned for national championships. So normally I am a big big supporter of real race on real date. But all will be fantasy so why not align Giro, Dauphine and TDS such that people can ride all three? For example:

9 May - 31 May: GIRO
Tu, 2 June - Tu, 9 June: DAUPHINE
Sa, 13 June - Su, 21 June: TOUR DE SUISSE
27 June - 19 July: LE TOUR

Reading at the same time in the news, ASO proposes two months delay of Le Tour: Start Aug 29 to Sep 20 according to Le Dauphine Libere. But according to Marca Le Tour in August, Vuelta in September and Giro in October....pah....

Just thinking out loud as the postponement sounds realistic at the moment.... I think we have two options for the Grand Tours. Because I am afraid we ride a real GT on a fantasy date and a second time the same GT on a real date! Because if a GT gets cancelled, will it be same route next year? Maybe yes!

Option 1) We ride as planned. But do we agree NOT to ride same GT on the real date AGAIN? Two times same profile with same opponents for 3 weeks sounds really boring! So it would have to be fantasy GT or completely different race whenever the real race happens.

Option 2) We ride a fair fantasy GT instead and agree to ride real GT whenever it happens. How fair? Fair only if

A) number of TT/Flat/Hilly/Mountain stages is exactly the same as planned.
B) category 5
C) Finished before end of the month for form settings.

Advantage of this would be that we "save" the real profiles for later if the real race happens but still offer a fair GT for all who prepared for this date.

Timeline for Giro would need be something like
Design until Tu, 21 April
Vote until Su, 26 April

So which Option?
Option 1) is good but needs some decision what happens IF the real race really is postponed and not completely cancelled.
Option 2) is good too, but would need very fast decision and design for Giro I guess.

Really thinking about it, probably too late for Option 2) because it takes too much time... so my proposal is probably stick with option 1). Just I'm a bit worried to ride a GT twice or fantasy GT or fantasy something instead of a real GT when it takes place in the future.

What do you think?

[IDF]

[el Galactico]

My opinion is to stick with Option 1. Reason is that there is nothing official yet and it is still very possible that we don't get to see a GT at all this year.
We can't make plans based on something a newspaper wrote.

I am in favor though to align at least Giro & Dauphine. Not sure though if there is also a need to align Dauphine and TDS as they always collided in recent years as far as I remember.

[Gipfelstuermer]

Thanks for the first opinions and might help luques/Donkey decide. It's also fine for me to stick to Option 1) and not trust newspaper sources like Galactico said.

Just if you prefer Option 1), can you tell me what you also write down what you would like for IF the real GT takes places in the future, e.g. later this year or 2021?

A) Ride same GT again.
B) Ride fantasy GT.
C) Ride other races.

[Pokemon Club]

I keep my mind for all the following races : keep it as it is in the original UCI calendar.
If we already have the design it is perfect, real drawing at the original date.
If we don't have the profile or the roadmap of the race, let's us race and stage from previous years.

Now in my personal case. I can't wait to have Giro on September or November when I planned to have my climber leader Hamada 33 years old in April already. It isn't the 70% tax that will help me to buy another leader NOW. We didn't move Springs Classics, I don't want we move the others races too.

[Robyklebt]

For the Giro 2020, or someone tries to draw fantasy with the right start and finish cities (that are already public), or we take some of the previous years. Preferably not 2019. But well, Giro 2000 or 2010 if we want to get 10/20 years back in design We could even quickly vote for the year we would like! Personnally, no preference, if it looks like to a real Giro (or is a real Giro^^)

Ignorance is bliss.

[Laurens88]

I keep my mind for all the following races : keep it as it is in the original UCI calendar.
If we already have the design it is perfect, real drawing at the original date.
If we don't have the profile or the roadmap of the race, let's us race and stage from previous years.

Couldn't agree more. It's bad to skip an important race now just because it may or may not be raced later in real life. The game, especially now that the number of players went up again, needs the well-known races. I would prefer to ride an old Dunkerque, California or Tour of Norway over riding a fantasy tour.
And also for Giro, Tour and Vuelta we better stick to the original plan. Riding the same race twice per year is not fun, and if we skip it now and the race can still not happen in autumn, what will we do? Nobody is interested in riding a fantasy Giro in September... And indeed teams may have planned their leaders for the GT's already which will be too old at the end of the year. But ok, maybe I don't need to talk about GT's because I never ride them anyway.

[CircleCycle]

So would it be possible to change the dates for Dauphine?

Never too early to discuss calendar and currently Dauphine planned for May so correct timing.

Original dates were:
Sa, 9 May - Su, 31 May: GIRO
Su, 31 May - Su, 7 June: DAUPHINE
Sa, 6 June - Su, 14 June: TOUR DE SUISSE
Sa, 27 June - Su, 19 July: LE TOUR

All of them will be fantasy, yes. The time between TDS and TDF was planned for national championships. So normally I am a big big supporter of real race on real date. But all will be fantasy so why not align Giro, Dauphine and TDS such that people can ride all three? For example:

9 May - 31 May: GIRO
Tu, 2 June - Tu, 9 June: DAUPHINE
Sa, 13 June - Su, 21 June: TOUR DE SUISSE
27 June - 19 July: LE TOUR

My idea was just to move Dauphine for 1 day (01.06-08.06) to give the Teams that ride Giro the choice for either Dauphine OR TdS. Postponing also TdS would be too much in my opinion, but is also an acceptable option.

As for Giro, I think we should just ride it and if there is another Giro in autumn I'd propose to ride a fantasy Giro in Rsf as cat4. with same dates, but different route.

Another Update considering Romandie. Ok, cancelled, but so far it was the only race we didn't ride which is in the UCI World Tour 2020. It would have counted for the Poke-statistics in the other thread, while Yorkshire is a) completely different and b) doesn't count there. Any ideas what to do about that?!

[Robyklebt]

On Dunkerque, Norway, Dauphine: Can somebody comment who does not ride Giro? I don't really have an opinion other than we should try to have an acceptable parallel programme for those who cannot ride 3 weeks of a Grand Tours. Acceptable also means not too many editions so that they have sensible peloton sizes.

Well, you're not only allowed an opinion if you plan to ride it. Actually you should have an opinion for everything, since all is connected! I'm not going to ride any of this parallel shit, but of course I do have an opinion.

Case Dunkerque: Last year we didn't ride it, it seems. Dunkerque-Giro-California overlap, that numbers thing, so cut Dunkerque probably. Details most likely in that thread... So here IMO using the 2019 profiles would be a simple and nice solution, should be found easily. We don't ride the exactly same profiles twice.

Case Norway: We did ride it last year, and I'm still of the opinion riding the same profile as we did last year is rather strange, since tours generally change parcours any year.

My proposal would be some OL fantasy race, think he designed one last year, or some other one, since we haven't used european fantasy tours for years now, and they are still occasionally being designed. Probably unused ones around, just hard to find... This the OL one for example viewtopic.php?f=14&t=77&start=250#p98470
Check if the downhill pavé is -3 or more, and correct if necessary, cut that annoying 18 from the title and then off we go. Right length, 4 days. Profiles in Norway usually hilly but not TT, more sprinty in real life, but it doesn't really have to be a copy of Norway anyway. Use a tour that somebody designed already seems ok for me. This or some other that somebody can find would be my proposal at this point. And since it's fantasy then (I resent the Giro and other real races being called fantasy, just because they are postponed or cancelled, it's still the real tracks of the planned race, find another word!!!) the date could be changed as well to maybe have only one real race in parallel. Get it off the weekend.

Giro and Dauphine are overlapping by one day. Normally in June you had the decision to ride Dauphine or Tour de Suisse, now if you ride the Giro no decision anymore.
So would it be possible to change the dates for Dauphine?

As usual I'm opposed to postponements. And as usual if a majority and Luques are for it, ok... Seems indeed a possibility worth thinking about. But see the next thing too.

Another general thing

Just thinking out loud as the postponement sounds realistic at the moment.... I think we have two options for the Grand Tours. Because I am afraid we ride a real GT on a fantasy date and a second time the same GT on a real date! Because if a GT gets cancelled, will it be same route next year? Maybe yes!

Yep. And that IMO is the only argument for a fantasy Giro/Tour/Vuelta. If we have the same parcours next year.

This situation will happen to the Tour de Suisse btw. According to Zauberlehrlinge cancelled for 2020, this years parcours will be ridden in 2021. I'm not a fan of riding the same route twice, be it 19-20 or 20-21, so any ideas on that? I suspect it will be the same thing with Dauphiné, not sure if that's officially cancelled or they are still aiming for a postponement... So what to do in those cases? Planned parcours on the real date in 2020+same boring ass shit 2021 (actually TdS parcours looks nice, even if rather anti-sprinter but riding it twice.... Donkey is opposed) So first what to do in those cases? TdS first, probably Dauphiné too, others maybe as well. Somehow I would be tempted to go for a fantasy TdS directly there, lower category no problem. But opinions?

And as Gipfel asked, what to do with GTs in case the same situation arises, a GT not ridden this year, parcours from 2020 ridden in 2021? We ride the same again? Personnally sounds higly unexciting and should be avoided if possible. But riding some fantasy in 2021 when they ride the real parcours of this year... not nice either.

So opinions on GTs too.

Couldn't agree more. It's bad to skip an important race now just because it may or may not be raced later in real life. The game, especially now that the number of players went up again, needs the well-known races. I would prefer to ride an old Dunkerque, California or Tour of Norway over riding a fantasy tour.

Well, California wasn't going to be ridden anyway in 2020, cancelled, regarless of Corono, so see no point at all in riding that.
Norway 2019 had 6 stages, 2020 4 planned (at first they thought they can't race it at all, then on, then Corona).. .for me a fantasy race doesn't sound worse...


Anyway, Girotimes.

[luques]

To be honest, guess I would be for option 2.

Actually I think there is a good probability that they will ride Tour and not Giro or Vuelta.

At least for Giro the city where a stage start and finish pay a huge fee, so I think that there is a good chance that next year the same track will be mantained (or at least starting and ending cities), also because usually organizations tend to not give back the money but postpone.

So, after all, I think there are good chances that next year tours won't be that different from this year (if they don't ride them obviously), at least as for the Italian side.

Up to you anyway, just wanted to give a different point of view.

[el Galactico]

IF they end up riding the 2020 profiles next year we could still do a Fantasy design for next year's Giro with a proper competition and enough time to do so. It would actually be fun and everybody would have enough time to present his designs. I just think it would be not enough time to create a fantasy Giro now until end of month.

[Robyklebt]

He's alive, he's alive!!!


Ok, so concentrating on the Giro for a moment, but of course the thing is similar for the TdF and Vuelta (but agree with Luques that a Giro cancellation is more likely than a Tour cancellation)

It's clear we'll ride a Giro on the planned dates: Possibilites

1)We ride the Giro 2020 in May as planned, then

a) real Giro is ridden later this year. We ignore
b) real Giro is ridden later this year, We ride it again.
c) real Giro not ridden this year. Same parcours 2021, we ride it again.
d) real Giro not ridden this year, Same parcourse 2021, we ride a fantasy one.


Here I think only a) a good solution. b) to me looks bad, 2 Giri in one year, same parcours, blaaa, c) ride the Giro with the same parcours 2 years in a row, blaaaa, d) if the real Giro is on, I'd prefer to ride the real parcours.

2) We ride a fantasy Giro.
a) real Giro ridden later, We ignore
b) real Giro ridden later, we ride it.
c) real Giro not ridden this year, same parcours 2021, we ride it then.


Here to me b) and c) make sense. We ride a Giro now, and ride the "real 2020" when it will be ridden, be it later this year or in 2021.
Of course there is the chance that the Giro is not ridden this year and they change the parcours for 2021.... But don't think that's too likely. Maybe some stages change a bit, maybe a few host towns change, but my guess is that if the Giro is not ridden in 2020 it would look very very similar, if not identical to the Giro 20.

Looking at it like that, actually having a fantasy Giro in May seems better. Hm, I think I change my vote to that after all.

The third possibility of course is an old edition, the possibilites then would be the same as with the fantasy one. Personnally not a fan, especially not a recent one. Cleary prefer a fantasy one, but it is a possibility.

IF we go for the fantasy one though, I don't see the big need for a big competition, then we have 7 Giri designed for nothing (and mine would be the best anyway)... Just somebody volunteers, Gipfel a good volunteer actually, since he likes designing the Giro anyway (doesn't mean it has to be him, somebody bribing Luques for the right would have good chances too, but I'd like some part of the bribe too) and he shouldn't be bound by the Giro 2020 to closely either. Just make a realistic one (that includes the completely flat Po-Ebene" stage!!!), one that is more or less in the spirit of the Giro of the last years.

Anyway, before we start talking about possible fantasy versions.

The Donkey, enlightened, clever and friendly as he is believes

1 a) 2 b) and 2 c) are good solutions. And since I seem to like 2 better than 1 my vote is rather for 2 now.

[Gipfelstuermer]

Ok, trying to stick to Donkey Options:

Good solution according to Donkey:
1) We ride the Giro 2020 in May as planned. If real Giro is ridden later this year, we ignore.

Question to Donkey: If real Giro is ridden in 2021, what do you prefer? We ignore or fantasy Giro or ride it again? My opinion: Could accept to ride it again then (although riding again is somehow boring), because there is a complete year in between. It will be totally different riders and teams. Just like MSR 2021 won't be boring, Giro 2021 won't be boring either. Ok, maybe a bit boring, but it's still very nice to ride the real race which you follow in real life.

2) We ride a fantasy Giro in May. If real Giro is ridden later this year (or in 2021), we ride it.

I am OK with both solutions. And I can design fantasy Giro probably. But my feeling from the discussion in chat and forum is, that most managers are clearly expecting solution 1 (Giro 2020 in May as planned). I think not all of them have thought of the consequences (Ignore if later this year, maybe have same Giro again in 2021), but if they expect it and would like to ride real Giro now, probably this is what we should deliver for the game now.

But would be helpful if more managers speak up: Do you expect real Giro 2020 now in May? (with all consequences for later and 2021) Or prefer the solution 2 with a fantasy Giro in May and real Giro only when it is ridden?

Oh, and last but not least, I expect same strategy for Giro, Le Tour and Vuelta. Would be chaotic, if we handle one different from another for the same problem.

Edit: Who prefers what currently?

Real Giro in May 2020: Jäger, Poke, Gala, Falkenbier

Fantasy Giro in May 2020: Rasmussen, luques

[GreenMotion]

I am for the Giro as it was planned.
Later in the year we can ride a fantasy tour (if the giro is made up).
If it is next year, I would ride the Giro normally again next year (profile from 2020).

best regards
Jäger-LeCultre

[Rasmussen]

I prefer in May a fantasy giro and october the real one. Dont want to see giro in TV and ride a fantasy giro or even no giro at all. That's my opinion for all the races, also for the ones cancelled in 2020 and use the same route in 2021 like Tour de Suisse and maybe Dauphine.

[Pokemon Club]

First you should all stop with the thing "and if real Giro in 2021...". For the moment Google remember me each time I open it that Flash Player stop in December 2020, and as long we don't migrate on the new C4F there is no C4F in 2021 in all case.
BTW I don't get you guys. When I said we should cancel Tour of Oman because the king of Oman died, you were all disagree, and the explanation I kept in mind was "it was scheduled like that so keep it like that" (well maybe I imagine that need to check), but in that case there is no reason to change that for all the following race. We keep the original dates for at least 15 or 20 races already, it is too late to change that in my opinion.

[Falkenbier]

1) We ride the Giro 2020 in May as planned. If real Giro is ridden later this year, we ignore.

That's what I would prefer.
We alrady rode the whole spring season although nearly every race was cancelled in reality. So why should we not ride Giro when it was planned? And it's a big difference between c4f and reality. One year means a life of a cyclist in this game. Don't take them the chance of riding the GT's!
And I even won't have a problem to ride a similar Giro next year again. Teams will look different...

So my vote goes to Real Giro in May 2020

[Robyklebt]

Ok, trying to stick to Donkey Options:

Good solution according to Donkey:
1) We ride the Giro 2020 in May as planned. If real Giro is ridden later this year, we ignore.

Question to Donkey: If real Giro is ridden in 2021, what do you prefer? We ignore or fantasy Giro or ride it again? My opinion: Could accept to ride it again then (although riding again is somehow boring), because there is a complete year in between. It will be totally different riders and teams. Just like MSR 2021 won't be boring, Giro 2021 won't be boring either. Ok, maybe a bit boring, but it's still very nice to ride the real race which you follow in real life.


Oh, and last but not least, I expect same strategy for Giro, Le Tour and Vuelta. Would be chaotic, if we handle one different from another for the same problem.

That's why after thinking it over, right now I tend to favor option 2.
But if we go for 1, then next year as you say, probably better the same Giro again, wouldn't like a fantasy Giro parallel to the real one, so same as you.

But basically those 3 options are the one that somehow make sense to me. What about you?

Strategy, yes, but the problem is as well that in June when we discuss the tour probably we know more....

What seems clear to me is that we will ride GTs on the original dates. What's unclear is what exactly

And as Luques said, the feeling is that Giro/Vuelta are more at risk than the tour, so even if we go for option 2 for the Giro that won't necessarily mean something from option 2 for the Tour as well.... if we know 90% that the Tour will indeed be ridden at the dates planned now, IMO we should just go for "real TdF on the original date and then ignore".

[team fl]

Real Giro in May 2020: Jäger, Poke, Gala, Falkenbier

Fantasy Giro in May 2020: Rasmussen, luques, Team FL

Fantasy Giro could be an old version or a kind of a "Best of" from different editions. So there would not be the need to design new stages. Perhaps...

[Hansa]

Real Giro in May 2020: Jäger, Poke, Gala, Falkenbier

Fantasy Giro in May 2020: Rasmussen, luques, Team FL

Fantasy Giro could be an old version or a kind of a "Best of" from different editions. So there would not be the need to design new stages. Perhaps...

Im fine with both if we dont chsnge the spririt of the 2020 Giro so we need similar profiles like same amount of flat hilly mountain stages and tts

[el Galactico]

The problem I see is that we have already past the half of April. When do you want to put a fantasy Giro online?
It is not like the guys interested can search profiles online like with real races. So it has to be online earlier than a real race imo.

I don't know what life Gip has apart of C4F but to design a 21 stage fantasy GT in less than 2 weeks is not that easy I think.

I would prefer to ride the Giro as planned and then decide later on with enough time how to continue once we know if there will be a Giro at all this year or the same profiles in 2021 (assuming C4F is still playable then )