Il Tour of Poland It's a race with many facets, a multifaceted event, we might say. Every rider and every team passes through here with different goals and ambitions. One of the teams that approaches the race with particular attention to what has happened and what will happen is the Cofidis. In which they fight agree, Cimolai e villella.
The French team is in the lower reaches of the World Tour standings, one of those teams that is fighting for survival, if we wanted to put it in football terms.
«And it still is – he says immediately Roberto Damiani, team sports director (in the opening photo on the left, ed.) – The situation is clear. There are more teams that are fighting in this ranking that has been drawn up over the last three seasons».
At the beginning of the season Bryan Coquard scored many points for Cofidis 
Benjamin Thomas also gave his good contribution to the team
At the beginning of the season Bryan Coquard scored many points for Cofidis 
Benjamin Thomas also gave his good contribution to the team
A good start
Cofidis had started the season very well, with a few more victories and a few more certainties, above all thanks to the sprints of Thomas e coquardBut then, over the course of the season, she got a bit lost, and now she's trying to find the thread again.
"As I said," Damiani continued, "we started well, with a few wins and some good finishes. Then we've been less present in the points at the Grand Tours, up until now. This says a lot about how important the type of points distribution that is done in the various races is.There's an extremely important second half of the season, we've recovered a lot. At the beginning of the year we were nineteenth, now we are sixteenth, 5 points behind EF Easy PostIt's really a point-to-point battle, like in a football championship."
Sprinters = points
The sprinters have the best chance of scoring points. From this perspective, the French (Thomas and Coquard) gave something more than our Consonni and Cimolai.
«If we talk about “Cimo” he hasn't collected in terms of quantity – Roberto continues with a deep voice – but he was asked to do a certain job as the last man. So either you get points or you do a certain type of work. As far as Consonni is concerned, in fact, victory was missing, because the best finish is second place. From this point of view, he suffers a bit morally. He came to us as Viviani's "pilot fish," and now he's taken on some responsibilities, and that does him credit. When someone does this job out of passion and desire to do well, they also feel an internal pressure, which on the one hand we must dampen and on the other encourage in the positive sense of the term."
The Grand Tours
Cofidis has had its share of ups and downs in major stage races. Sometimes, bad luck has also played a role, and when you're fighting point-by-point, chance plays its part.
«In the Grand Tours we had two sides of the same coin. At the Giro we also did well, Consonni moved well for what he had to do. From another side William Martin he had a Giro with lights and shadows, it was certainly not an easy edition.
«At the Tour I would say that Covid has heavily penalised us, first Coquard's positivity and then Martin's crippled us.. There was a beautiful situation of gifts who took the polka-dotted jersey and tried to defend it in every way. However, in terms of points, we didn't collect much. However, I feel like making a point, Intermediate shirts are important, even for the show, so points should also be given for these things. There is a fundamental reasoning to be made about the rankings, for example: winning a stage at the Giro gets you fewer points than a 1.1 race (a topic of discussion that we have already treated, ed.)».
A difficult management
Balancing the needs of the team and those of the riders is difficult, but it's also the arduous task of the sporting director. Of course, when it comes to points, math unfortunately takes center stage.
“The riders are riders and we are sports directors, and that’s right,” says Damiani, “but they understand what’s happening. Many times you see teams that get very good results with riders who are not in the top ten and therefore these points are lost.I will continue to say that it is much better to race to win, that way you also score points.
"On the other hand, I realize that sometimes it's better to finish second or third with riders who have points than to win with a guy who doesn't have any: it's crazy to say it, but it's true. Not that riders can't emerge, we have a new professional like Zingle who did well, won some races and got into the top ten."
