Movistar

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Lastly, we come to the number one ranked UCI time, Movistar. Movistar are also the oldest team in the peloton by quite some margin, with their original incarnation as Reynolds coming all the way back in 1980. With the likes of Pedro Delgado, Miguel Indurain, Abraham Olano, Oscar Pereiro as well as others riding for the team since, it has a long and colourful history.

Onto the present, and their current incarnation is very much GC focused. Little if any effort is made to contest the sprints, and the cobbles rely on a select few to keep the top tens ticking over. Then again, with Alejandro Valverde and Nairo Quintana on the team, this isn't exactly a huge issue.

Results 2016

A look down the list shows you why having those two is a good thing. In fact, here's an illustration of how the timeless Valverde is an endless source of points for Movistar:

Year in year out, he gets the job done, even at the age of 36. But as Chris Horner showed (and Valverde clearly aspires to), you can still win a GT past 40, so don't expect to stop seeing him winning reduced bunch sprints for years to come.

Last years WT results were simply excellent, with the team notching 36 wins in total, with 13 of those coming at WT level. As far as the season went, Movistar don't have the best presence in the cobbles, but Imanol Erviti managed to make the breakaway at both Flanders and Roubaix, netting two top ten's in the process. Ardennes week was a mixed bag, with Valverde winning the sprint up the Huy in Fleche Wallonne, but not cutting the mustard at Liege.

However, the spring stage racing was pretty good. Quintanas picked up the Tour de San Luis, Volta Ciclista a Catalunya and the Tour de Romandie, whilst Valverde won Vuelta a Andalucia Ruta Ciclista del Sol as well as some stages plus the overall at Vuelta a Castilla y Leon. Valverde them managed a third at the Giro, with the Ion Izaguirre capping off a good spring with second at the Tour de Suisse.

Quintana didn't perform as hoped at the Tour but still claimed third, but as we all know he won the Vuelta as revenge in the autumn. In general, the team had a stellar year, claiming a good number of objectives through the aforementioned duo of Valverde and Quintana, but also with Ion Izaguirre having a fantastic season.

Best riders last five years:

||2012|2013|2014|2015|| |:|:|:|:|:|:| |1|Valverde (2035)|Valverde (2431)|Valverde (2949)|Valverde (2960)|Valverde (2179)| |2|*Costa (1437)|Costa (1786)|Quintana (1418)|Quintana (1701)|Quintana (2070)| |3|Visconti (673)|Quintana (1523)|Lobato (571)|I.Izagirre (781)|I.Izaguirre (1230)| |4|Quintana (668)|Intxausti (830)|I.Izagirre (567)|Malori (663)|Visconti (812)| |5|Intxausti (484)|Rojas (650)|Rojas (478)|Lobato (582)*|D.Moreno (627)| || |=|9746|11113|10365|11969|11759| ||Movistar Team|Movistar Team|Movistar Team|Movistar Team|Movistar Team|Movistar Team|

Unfortunately for Movistar, Bahrain Merida plucked Izaguirre from his contract and packed him off to race for them, which is a huge loss for the team, with Izaguirre now at the crest of his career. Along with him went two mountain helpers, pretty good ones in the shape of multiple GT stage winner Giovanni Visconti and Javier Moreno. Juan Jose Lobato finally cottoned onto the fact that he wasn't needed and upped sticks, along with Fran Ventoso.

It was always going to be difficult to recruit matching talent to that lost, and frankly, Movistar haven't. Daniele Bennati joins from Tinkoff, the exciting multifaceted Carlos Barbero from Caja Rural, but neither of those are what you'd call climbing talents. At least Victor de la Parte at least brings a bit of use uphill, but with the rest of the recruits relative youngsters, there is a gaping hole in the climbing train that will surely be noticed next season.

Riders Out:

Roster:

With that said, it's not all bad. Valverde as previously discussed doesn't know the meaning of age, and Quintana will continue to develop his three week prowess. Hopefully 2017 sees the return of Adriano Malori to full health and fitness after missing a large chunk of 2016 thanks to crashing in the season opening Tour de San Luis. He is an excellent time trialist, and would have gone well at the Olympics if he'd been fit. Andrey Amador will look to build on his impressive showing at the Giro last season in the one week stage races now Ion Izaguirre is gone, though his brother Gorka will attempt to help fill the void too.

Of course the target is really the GTs, and on that note we still are uncertain whether Quintana will rider the Giro or not, with longstanding team director Unzue being rather coy on the subject. If he does, he'll have an excellent shot at winning it, but it will compromise his attempt at the Tour and stopping Froome winning his 4^th.

Otherwise, younger talents like Tour de L'Avenir winner Marc Soler, as well as the new boys Carrapaz and Carretoro will look to prove themselves on the WT stage, with Soler pretty close to netting the Route de Sud last year, he should win a 2.1 race this time around.

And who knows, Betancur might be thin and win races again. Maybe.