Pete's World Cycling Rankings

With the advent this year of the new Pro Tour, the UCI's old system of rider rankings has been replaced by a new system characterized by two big changes: (1) Only official Pro Tour events now count, and points are, in general, harder to come by. (2) Rather than based on a revolving calendar that takes into account the previous 12 months of results, only results in the current calendar year are now tallied. In other words, every rider starts the new year afresh at zero. I personally don't have a big problem with change #1, but change #2 means the Pro Tour rankings provide a rather strange accounting of who the world's best cyclists are, especially during the first half of the year when the list of completed events is small. Add to this concern the fact that no points system is going to be perfect, inevitably undervaluing some performances (e.g., stage wins) while overvaluing others, I've decided to offer my own, very subjective ranking. With the Tour de France now complete, I figure it's time I unveil my first official Top Ten. Look for my next ranking at the end of August, during the early stages of the Vuelta. Pete's World Cycling Rankings (July 25, 2005) 1. Lance Armstrong (current Pro Tour standing = 2) 2. Danilo Di Luca (1) 3. Tom Boonen (4) 4. Alexandre Vinokourov (3) 5. Ivan Basso (12) 6. Alessandro Petacchi (5) 7. Paolo Salvodelli (9) 8. Paolo Bettini (41) 9. Bobby Julich (16) 10. Damiano Cunego (27) Top Team: Discovery Channel, with honorable mention to CSC, Phonak, and Quick Step I'm not really a Lance Armstrong fan, but seven tours speak for themselves, and it seems a no-brainer that the greatest TdF rider of his or any generation retire from the sport ranked #1. Even if he were not retiring, though, he wouldn't last long atop my list for the simple reason that he has made himself the Bjorn Borg of cycling. Despite possessing incredible all-around skills, just like Borg at Wimbledon during the 1970s and '80s, every July Armstrong takes center stage with a dominant performance in his sport's annual marquee event, only to disappear into relative obscurity the rest of the year. That was actually less true of Borg than of Armstrong, as the Tour really stands alone in cycling today--particularly from a U.S. vantage point--while Wimbledon is perhaps a "first among equals" when compared to the other three Grand Slam events. While Armstrong's choice to focus solely on the Tour is entirely defensible, especially when it results in an unprecedented string of seven victories, it's nonetheless been frustrating for cycling fans. The Giro, the Vuelta, the World Championships, the Olympics, the spring and fall classics, have all suffered from Armstrong's absence, and his unwillingness to even contest these events will inevitably tarnish his legacy in the sport. Indeed, in a sport whose fans value more than anything else spontaneous displays of courage and a willingness to fail, the superbly talented and dedicated Armstrong will always be remembered as much for what he didn't even try to accomplish as for the incredible feats that he did. Retiring "early" before actually being dethroned by another champion only adds to that legacy. As for the rest of my inaugural top ten, Danilo Di Luca and Tom Boonen have already had dream seasons and promise to deliver even more stellar results this fall. They were the two dominant figures in the spring classics--Boonen on the cobblestones of Flanders and Di Luca in the hills of Wallonia--and then Di Luca shined even brighter in the Giro while Boonen was the dominant sprinter early on in the Tour. Not far behind these two riders is Alexandre Vinokourov; after something of a slow start this year (for him and his T-Mobile team), he delivered a brilliant win at Liege and then animated the Tour like no other rider, not even Armstrong. With strong rides at both the Giro and Tour, Ivan Basso looks on target to replace Armstrong as the world's best grand-tour rider, while Alessandro Petacchi still deserves to be called the world's greatest sprinter, with a Milan-Sanremo win more than compensating for a somewhat subpar (by his recent standards) Giro. Paolo Salvodelli is enjoying a dream comeback season, with a Giro victory and Tour stage win to his credit. Paolo Bettini, on the other hand, has been relatively quiet this year, but the Olympic champion and three-time winner of the now-discontinued World Cup was the "Vinokourov" of the Giro's first week. Rounding out the list are the rejuvenated Bobby Julich, winner of Paris-Nice and Criterium Internationale early in the season and more recently a very solid contributor to Team CSC's efforts in the Tour; and illness-slowed Damiano Cunego, the young Italian star who finished his dream season last year ranked #1 in the world and did just enough in the early stages of this year's Giro to remain in my top ten. Honorable Mention honors go to the following (in alphabetical order): Santiago Botero (7) -- has rejuvenated his career at Phonak Oscar Freire (8) -- reigning world champion Roberto Heras (not ranked) -- reigning Vuelta champion George Hincapie (10) -- KBK, Roubaix podium, stage win and top 20 at the Tour...best year ever for arguably the greatest helper of all time; a true superdomestique Levi Leipheimer (15) -- solid efforts at the Tour and the Dauphine, but it's about time he actually won something Robbie McEwen (68) -- Petacchi's only real rival in the sprints; the Pro Tour points system doesn't do him justice Davide Rebbelin (11) -- last year's Di Luca who rather quietly has ridden almost into the 2005 Pro Tour's top ten Gilberto Simoni (19) -- proud former champion of the Giro who's done much to animate that great race the last two years Jan Ullrich (6) -- the Simoni of the Tour Alejandro Valverde (32) -- Spain's answer to Cunego; could he have ridden with Lance all the way to Paris if not for the bum knee?