UCI Rankings Team Update | Astana storms into second place; another 1000+ week for UAE

This week's update features points scored in one-day races Clásica de Almería, Clásica Jaén Paraíso Interior and Figueira Champions Classic, as well as stage races Tour of Oman, Vuelta a la Región de Murcia and Tour de la Provence. The Asian continental championships are also included.

You can check the previous UCI Rankings update here. UAE Team Emirates - XRG remains firmly in control, gaining over 1000 points in just one week and raising its tally to 3229. The Emirati squad is having an even better start of the season that last year, which is not an easy task. They had four victories throughout the week, all of them with different riders.

On the one hand, António Morgado won the Figueira Champions Classic for the second year in a row, earning 250 points. The Portuguese rider is in outstanding shape, and he has finished in the top 10 in all the seven races he has competed in so far. His teammates Brandon McNulty and Felix Grosschartner also finished in the top 10 in Portugal, securing 140 more points to their team.

This was not the only time that three UAE riders made it to the top 10 the past week. Clásica Jaén Paraíso Interior took place on Monday and UAE dominated as usual, with 3 riders in the top 10, 2 of them in the podium.

Tim Wellens emerged victorious after more than 40km solo, with Benoit Cosnefroy securing the third place and Igor Arrieta making it to the seventh position. The final prize was 230 UCI points for the team, and it could have been more had not Jan Christen been disqualified for causing Maxim van Gils to crash in the final sprint for the podium.

The Vuelta a Murcia also saw several UAE riders dominating. Marc Soler won the first and eventually only stage (the second one had to be neutralized due to strong winds, and even if there was a final 10km circuit, results of the stage did not count towards UCI rankings), after a long breakaway alongside his teammate Julius Johansen, who was second. Tim Wellens, Igor Arrieta and Benoit Cosnefroy were also in the top 10 of the day, showing the absolute domination of the Emirati team.

Juan Sebastián Molano put the finishing touch with a powerful sprint at the first stage of the Tour of Oman, allowing him to win for the first time since May last year. Adam Yates did not manage to secure the GC of the race for the second year in a row, but he finished in third place nonetheless, earning 140 points.

The past week was almost a UAE monologue, but there were other teams with strong results as well. It is the case of XDS Astana Team, which has overtaken Jayco AlUla after getting more than 1000 points and are now second in the rankings. Christian Scaroni and Cristián Rodríguez were first and second in the last stage of the Tour of Oman, same as in the GC, obtaining more than 500 points just by themselves.

The other 500 points came from the Asian continentals, as Yevgeniy Fedorov, Haoyu Su and Nicolas Vinokurov finished in first (250 points), second (200 points) and fourth place (125 points) respectively. A huge reward for the Kazakh team, as they took advantage of a weak startlist.

Jayco AlUla is now in third place, having earned 300 points. They came almost entirely from Oman, in which Mauro Schmid and Paul Double were fourth and fifth in the final GC. The Swiss rider also won the first stage, showing his impressive shape during the early season.

Red Bull - BORA - hansgrohe is in fourth place, after a quiet week in which Remco Evenepoel did not compete, while NSN Cycling Team jumped to fifth place thanks to Biniam Girmay's victory at the Clásica de Almería.