As a knowledge science nerd, I have been carefully following the skilled biking’s promotion/relegation scheme because it started in 2020, monitoring the UCI Workforce Rankings that can decide which 18 groups would possibly get a WorldTour licence. I’ve picked aside every staff’s outcomes, rosters and technique whereas additionally taking a wider view on how the comparatively new scheme has modified the game.
For the needs of this text, the Ladies’s WorldTour – equally as attention-grabbing by way of racing – should take a again seat. Between groups going away and fewer purposes for WorldTour licences, there hasn’t been the dramatic battle to keep away from relegation that we have see on the boys’s facet.
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Origins of biking’s relegation system
It began with a fierce battle between the UCI and essentially the most highly effective race organisers, the Amaury Sport Organisation (ASO), who run the Tour de France, Paris-Roubaix, Paris-Good and plenty of different prime occasions.
The UCI, in an try to create a cohesive calendar the place one of the best groups and riders would usually face one another, in addition to extra stability for groups, created the WorldTour (or ProTour because it was initially referred to as). The idea was pretty easy: a set variety of groups can be required to compete in a set variety of prime races so followers may benefit from the races with nice competitors.
From the inception, ASO objected to being pressured to ask groups that they’d no hand in selecting, citing an inventory of objections and calls for over time and complaining of a ‘closed system’. Doping scandals like Operación Puerto in 2006 and the 2007 Tour de France doping instances involving stage 13 winner Alexandre Vinokourov and race chief Michael Rasmussen solely bolstered ASO’s case for stricter controls on who will get into the highest tier.
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To chop out years of historical past far outdoors the scope of this text, the ASO vs. UCI battle finally led to the moral, organisational and monetary standards that we see for WorldTour licences at the moment. However the final demand for sporting standards took for much longer.
The explanation was easy: professional biking had a pesky doping downside, and including strain for outcomes would solely push riders towards unlawful efficiency enhancement moderately than away from it. As soon as the Athlete Organic Passport was in place and displaying an impact on the doping downside, it paved the best way for the UCI so as to add sporting standards to WorldTour licences in 2020.
Is it a coincidence {that a} French UCI president, David Lappartient, was the one to make it occur? Is it a coincidence that it got here on the heels of Israel Biking Academy (because it was then recognized), owned by billionaire Sylvan Adams, becoming a member of the WorldTour by buying Katusha’s WorldTour licence in 2019? Presumably not.
How the factors system improved from 2022
Throughout the 2020-2022 promotion/relegation interval, the factors construction got here underneath heavy criticism for the weighting of one-day races in comparison with stage wins within the Tour de France. Third place on the ProSeries Faun-Ardèche Basic was price 125 factors whereas a Tour de France stage win was price 120 factors.
Cofidis and Arkéa-Samsic took benefit of this and centered a lot of their seasons on lower-level races within the ProSeries or Class 1 (.1) occasions, due to the factors imbalance.
Moreover, the system solely factored within the outcomes of the highest 10 riders of every staff counted towards their staff rankings, and Grand Tour phases solely went five-deep for factors, Arkéa-Samsic stacking the highest 20 of the Tro-Bro Léon made a whole lot of sense for the staff’s future, however maybe didn’t make for thrilling racing. In consequence, Arkéa had been promoted with solely 3,842 of their factors coming from the WorldTour in contrast with Lotto’s 6,518 WorldTour factors.
The UCI re-worked the factors construction to provide fewer factors for one-day races relative to the extra closely weighted Tour de France earlier than the beginning of the 2023-2025 cycle. WorldTour races victories now vary from 1,300 for the Tour de France, 1,100 for the Giro d’Italia and Vuelta a España, 800 for any of the Monuments, down to simply 300, primarily based on historic significance.
You possibly can see the relative variations within the accessible factors within the chart under.
Since 2023, there are extra factors for WorldTour races in comparison with different collection occasions, and the factors are 15-deep for phases of Grand Excursions and 60-deep for the GC or one-day races, which provides riders one thing to struggle for.
The staff rankings now embody the highest 20 riders moderately than the highest 10 of every staff, giving a profit to groups with deeper rosters.
Is it extra even? Sure – the Grand Excursions have a a lot larger piece of the general pie, whereas one-day races, which accounted for nearly half of the full accessible factors in 2020-2022 are actually a couple of third.
Has the system rewarded essentially the most certified groups? Within the first cycle, Lotto and Israel outperformed Arkéa in WorldTour races however had been relegated. Because the revamp, Uno-X Mobility are prone to be promoted as soon as the Lotto-Intermarché merger is remaining, however they scored the fewest factors of any of the highest groups in WorldTour races, nonetheless scoring most of their factors within the ProSeries.
XDS Astana’s miraculous turnaround
The stress of the relegation battle has been palpable each in 2022 and this 12 months. The strain ramped up within the final months of 2025 when the relegation got here right down to just some hundred factors over three years of racing, with Cofidis most notably ending up on the shedding facet of the battle.
One staff that had been sweating relegation for 2 years and will have been anxious in 2025 had been XDS Astana, however their miraculous season did not simply have them sneak by to remain within the WorldTour.
With a give attention to enhancing every part from recruiting, to calendars, and even race techniques, they exceeded all expectations. However the one manner the staff may have executed that was with an even bigger funds.
XDS Astana had been the prime instance of how a money infusion can flip a staff’s fortunes. They had been properly on their option to relegation after the 2023 and 2024 seasons, and got here into this 12 months useless final of the WorldTour groups. Nevertheless, they secured the Chinese language bike maker XDS as a brand new sponsor, and with the infusion of money, had been ready to usher in a raft of expertise to assist execute their plan to stay within the WorldTour. Sadly, professional biking is secretive about budgets, so it is troublesome to precisely analyse outcomes primarily based on it.
Nevertheless, Astana’s new sponsor helped the staff convey on a knowledge scientist who helped the managers and administrators provide you with a calendar and choose simply the suitable sorts of riders, together with a stronger staff of coaches and employees to assist the riders all through the season and guarantee they had been in preventing kind.
It additionally supported an enormous enhance within the variety of races by which the staff had been in a position to rating factors – they went from scoring in 74 and 88 races in 2023 and 2024, respectively, to 124 races this 12 months. Their common factors taken in these races went up from 96 and 76 to 135 – an enormous enhance that fuelled their ascent.
The adjustments had been astonishing: XDS Astana ended the 12 months in fourth for the 2025 season behind powerhouses UAE Workforce Emirates XRG, Visma-Lease a Bike, and Lidl-Trek.
Their tally of factors for the season – 16,712 – was greater than sufficient to carry them out of the relegation zone, climbing from twenty first to fifteenth for the three-year interval. I’ve highlighted the staff in blue on this animated bar chart race so you may see their progress within the three-year rankings over time. (Notice, the chart solely appears to be like at remaining rankings for 2023 and 2024 to maintain the animation moderately brief.)
Within the subsequent interactive chart, I calculated the variety of distinctive races every staff scored in during the last three seasons, and the typical factors per distinctive race. That is the place Astana’s various calendar actually popped out.
Mess around with the filter – you may click on on a staff’s title to indicate solely their information. You possibly can zero in on a single 12 months with the drop-down filter.
You possibly can see how XDS Astana banged away at a bunch of races, not scoring a ton of factors nevertheless it added as much as greater than sufficient.
Throughout all three years, it is astonishing how UAE Workforce Emirates excelled in each measures. They’re the large teal blobs within the higher proper, scoring a whole lot of factors in a whole lot of races.
Visma-Lease a Bike centered their efforts extra, scoring in 60-70 races every season however averaged extra per race than UAE generally.
Within the decrease proper quadrant, you may see that Cofidis (pink, hover over for the 12 months and extra information) scored in additional races than most groups and nonetheless had been relegated as a result of the factors they gained had been so low per race, on common.
I additionally wished to see what UCI class of races every staff centered on by way of accumulating factors. Whereas it is apparent that the WorldTour races have essentially the most factors, and every staff’s proportion of factors ought to favour these occasions, Uno-X Mobility’s largest class was the ProSeries at 36% of their factors over three years.
It is attention-grabbing that Visma-Lease a Bike and Bahrain Victorious virtually completely earn factors from the WorldTour. Arkéa-B&B Accommodations and Cofidis, the 2 relegated groups, had the best proportion of Class 1 races of their totals.
Subsequent, I wished to see how essential the switch market was for groups within the promotion/relegation battle. It was a tedious course of, however I got here away with the chart under, which reveals what proportion of a staff’s factors had been scored by riders new to the staff (incoming transfers) and the returning riders. I put the bars in Cyclingnews colours simply to get your consideration.
For Astana, it was shocking that, after their large recruitment for 2025, it was largely the returning riders who scored this season. Christian Scaroni and Simone Velasco have been with them since 2022, and Lorenzo Fortunato, who got here in 2024, had been the highest three for the staff, and 60% of their factors for this 12 months got here from returning riders. The other was the case in 2024, when the incoming riders buoyed the staff, however the total complete was a lot decrease throughout the board.
Nonetheless, throughout three years, Astana’s incoming riders had been chargeable for the biggest proportion of factors of any of the opposite 21 groups that I examined at 34.78%.
In distinction, Cofidis struggled within the switch market, and total, solely 18.68% of their factors got here from new riders. They lack the funds to convey on an present powerhouse rider, and as an alternative, tried to develop youthful riders from throughout the staff. After bringing on a bunch of riders for 2023 like Ion Izagirre, Bryan Coquard and Benjamin Thomas, additionally they misplaced strong riders over the three years like Victor Lafay, Max Walscheid, and Guillaume Martin. Of their investments for 2025 like Dylan Teuns, Emanuel Buchmann and Alex Aranburu, solely the Spaniard paid off as anticipated.
The staff blamed supervisor Cedric Vasseur for focusing an excessive amount of on scoring factors, which appears counterintuitive. However the reverse technique – maintaining victories as the principle focus and letting the factors comply with – is what helped convey Lotto again into the WorldTour, a minimum of till their dismal 2025 season. As a result of a lot of biking is psychological, it is smart that groups succeed by celebrating constructive outcomes and motivating riders to strive for good outcomes moderately than simply scoring no matter factors they will.
High quality over amount
Talking of wins, I believed it will be attention-grabbing to see what every staff’s common factors had been per win, and I used to be shocked on the consequence of this, too.
It reveals that groups do not essentially need to win so much to remain within the WorldTour; they will make an impression by being good at actually priceless races.
Alpecin-Deceuninck are the shining instance: they do not function excessive on the wins per 30 days column, after they do win, they make it rely greater than another staff.
That is primarily as a result of the truth that Mathieu van der Poel wins a whole lot of their races, and in main Classics. Paris-Roubaix and Milan-San Remo are price 800 factors to the winner. Moreover, Jasper Philipsen had a bunch of Grand Tour stage wins price 180 factors or 210 for the Tour. Their common win was price simply shy of 200 factors, greater than even UAE Workforce Emirates!
That is in all probability the one chart the place UAE, Visma and Lidl-Trek aren’t on the prime.
Evaluate that to the warmth map under displaying the variety of wins per 30 days by every staff throughout three years.
This warmth map clearly demonstrates simply how dominant UAE Workforce Emirates-XRG got here to be over the three years. Grouped by month, the darker colours are fewer victories, and the lighter the colour, the extra wins. This information solely appears to be like at one-day and GC victories and ignores different factors coming from main or profitable a minor classification in a stage race.
UAE Workforce Emirates XRG recorded essentially the most wins in a month in June 2025, partly as a result of 5 riders received nationwide titles. However the staff received three phases and the GC within the Dauphiné with Tadej Pogačar and the Tour de Suisse with João Almeida. Filippo Baroncini’s win within the Baloise Belgium Tour and Ivo Oliveira’s stage in Tour of Slovenia put them over the earlier most of 13 held by the identical staff in July 2024 and July 2025 and by Visma-Lease a Bike in September 2023.
Is profitable ‘momentum’ actual?
Once I noticed that Paul Magnier kicked off an enormous profitable streak for Soudal-Quickstep beginning with the GP de Fourmies on September 14 in 2025, I questioned if wins often are available in streaks after intervals of drought.
It was exhausting to name what Soudal-Quickstep did this fall a profitable streak, simply because they win usually sufficient to make a collection of victories uncommon.
I made a decision to go in search of groups that had an unusually lengthy interval and not using a win, after which went on to win as a lot or greater than they usually do.
What constitutes a drought is determined by how usually a staff often wins. A streak of 5 wins in 9 days was massive for Bahrain Victorious in June of 2024 as a result of they had been solely getting one or two per 30 days earlier than then.
So I requested Google’s Gemini to crunch the information as a result of it was past my capabilities. After a lot inner debate and experimentation, I requested it to outline a drought as a winless interval of 1 normal deviation longer than the staff’s common interval of being winless (not together with these spanning the low season), and a streak as a interval of a median or higher than common variety of wins.
It discovered 23 situations over the three years of this WorldTour relegation cycle that met this standards, however solely a handful had been statistically important. The least random was XDS Astana’s 9 wins after a interval of 51 straight days with out one, from July’s Tour of Qinghai to Christian Scaroni’s Giro della Romagna victory. After that, they received 4 phases of Tour de Langkawi, two and the GC in Tour of Taihu Lake, and a stage of the Tour de Kyushu.
Visma-Lease a Bike cracked a 38-day drought from April to Could in 2023 with a collection of 18 victories in Could and June, and Uno-X Mobility spent a torturous 78 days and not using a success at the beginning of 2024 till they turned it round with 14 wins in three months. Here is the place the components falls down, as these had been too scattered to qualify as a streak in most individuals’s minds.
I discovered greater than I actually wished to about statistics and what are referred to as ‘self-exciting processes’ via this train. Extra skilled information scientists, be happy to drop solutions within the feedback on what parameters to make use of.
However I am fairly certain most intervals of drought will not be damaged by streaks of victories although it usually feels prefer it.
What makes WorldTour staff?
What has been on my thoughts for lots of the final six years is what makes staff, aside from having famous person riders? A lot of the groups within the WorldTour are fairly evenly matched under the highest 5.
It is possible a mixture of components: funds, administration, recruitment and outcomes however in the long run, professional biking is a sport that includes human beings. If a staff is relegated, it is not the fault of anybody rider or sports activities director, however a team-wide technique failure, simply as a promotion is a full-press staff effort. They’re all good canines!
I attempted to visualise every staff’s qualities with a radar chart, and whereas it reveals some attention-grabbing issues like Ineos’ excessive variety of distinctive winners and Alpecin-Deceuninck’s deep reliance on a pair riders, what’s most gorgeous is UAE Workforce Emirates are superb in each class. The 2 relegated groups? They barely register with the size wanted to accommodate UAE!
The chances of analysing the WorldTour information are countless so I will depart it right here. Drop a remark if you wish to see the rest.
