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With the preliminary startlist in place, it seems that the quality of the competitors in the Amstel Gold Race has not profited from the calendar position swop with Paris-Roubaix. The startlist quality stands now at 700, signifcant lower than it has been in the last 15 years.

Table 1. Startlist quality last 15 editions

Breakdown

How do we compute the startlist quality? We look at the position of competing riders in the most actual PCS ranking. According to their position a rider is assigned a point score and the sum of these scores is the startlist quality. This gives a better representation than the sum of PCS points scored, because the number of races (and therefore the number of points to be scored) are not consistent per season. You can find the full breakdown for AGR here.

Looking at the breakdown for the 2022 edition, we see that there is only one rider competing from the top-10 of the PCS ranking (Matej Mohoric), three riders between position 11-25 and 4 riders between positions 26-50.

Table 2. Startlist quality breakdown

Table 3. Present riders from PCS ranking top-50

peer analysis

When comparing to other WorldTour races, we see that the Amstel has a comparable starting field with races like E3 classic and Strade Bianchi, but far short of the quality of the monuments.

Table 4. Startlist quality compared to same level races

Because Wout van Aert has to pass for this years edition, there will be a different winner than last year. Five riders from the 2021 top-10 will not be at the start this year.

Table 5. Present riders from other result