Relegation Watch 2025: XDS Astana's momentum accelerates as Picnic-PostNL, Arkéa-B&B Hotels stall in Spring Classics

It's been two weeks since our last relegation watch, and the team to watch is once again XDS Astana, who shrugged off a bit of a March slump and put themselves back on track for remaining in the WorldTour.

The team came into the season in a dismal 21st place in the 2023-2025 UCI Team Rankings. The promotion/relegation system determines which teams meet the sporting criteria of being in the top 18 to earn a WorldTour licence for the next cycle from 2026-2028.

Over the past year, a raft of new signings and a new title sponsor have given the team new life, and their performance in April shows the work is paying off.

In 2025, XDS Astana are third, only to UAE Team Emirates XRG and Lidl-Trek, who have been the most impressive teams in the Spring Classics.

The star of the month for XDS Astana has been Simone Velasco, who finished eighth overall in the Itzulia Basque Country with a third place on stage 5 and seventh place on stages 4 and 6, along with eighth in the GP Miguel Indurain, adding up to 191 points.

Davide Ballerini and Mike Teunissen gutted out 10th and 12th in the Tour of Flanders for 135 points and 95 points.

Smart choices to send teams to far-flung races might take a chunk out of the budget, but Aaron Gate brought a 150-point haul from the 2.Pro Tour of Hainan, winning stage 4 and finishing third overall, while Martin López won the 2.1-ranked Tour of Hellas overall for 125 points.

The haul was enough to put Astana ahead of Uno-X Mobility and into 19th place in the three-year rankings. They're still 1,314 points behind 18th-place Picnic-PostNL, but the German team has been lagging far behind XDS Astana in their points haul.

Uno-X Mobility, too, have been outpacing Picnic-PostNL, and are only 300 points behind XDS Astana. Overtaking Picnic-PostNL could be their ticket to the WorldTour.

The Norwegian outfit had a great run in the Classics this month, with Markus Hoelgaard taking eighth in Paris-Roubaix and 14th in the Tour of Flanders, and Alexander Kristoff scoring the same result in Scheldeprijs. Andreas Leknessund finished fourth in the 2.1-ranked Région Pays de la Loire Tour, and Stian Fredheim won the 1.1-ranked Route Adélie de Vitré.

If XDS Astana continue to increase their average points per week, which currently stands at 317 compared with Picnic-PostNl's 174, they should overtake them in four weeks. 

Uno-X Mobility have averaged 295 points per week, and are also on pace to move ahead of the German team, albeit later in the season.

Arkéa-B&B Hotels, in the darkness that is last place among WorldTour teams and prospective promotees, have lagged extremely far behind, with only 140 points per week. Their situation is not looking good so far at 24th in the 2025 rankings and 21st in the 2023-2025 standings, and they'll need a minor miracle to remain in the WorldTour.

However, there are major caveats to these projections.

The Giro d'Italia could change everything

It's no surprise that XDS Astana have done well so far this season, considering their focus on one-day races and lower-level events. It is the Spring Classics season, after all.

XDS Astana gained almost 70% of their points from one-day races - 24% from 1.1-ranked races, 19% from Pro Series one-day races and 25% from WorldTour one-day races. With the shift away from the Classics after Liège-Bastogne-Liège, the team could struggle to keep up the same pace of results.

The Giro d'Italia is a race where Picnic-PostNl are expected to get more results.

The Grand Tours have far more points for the final general classification and a solid amount for stage placings. Picnic-PostNL gained 40% of their points so far this year from WorldTour stage races and have strong GC riders like Romain Bardet and Max Poole, so they have a lot of opportunities in the Giro.

Bardet, who is due to retire in June, will compete in the final Grand Tour of his career in the Giro d'Italia and will certainly want to go out on a high note.

By comparison, XDS Astana and Uno-X Mobility might not feature as much in the GC, although stage wins are still a way to gain points, as are jerseys for the points and mountains classifications and to a lesser extent, wearing the race leader's jersey.

Further down the road, the WorldTour calendar is heavily weighted toward stage races, with only eight one-day events coming after Liège-Bastogne-Liège, the last race of the Spring Classics.

There are nine stage races out of the 15 on the WorldTour calendar still to come, including the biggest of all, the Tour de France, so predictions based on the current rankings will favour teams that excel in one-day races.