Who's at risk? UCI relegation battle update ahead of October finale

A week deep into October, the 2025 road season is drawing to a close, with the opportunities to score crucial UCI points continuing to fade.

We take a look at the current situation and how recent weeks since the last update on 18 September have affected the teams who are currently in and around the relegation zone. The top 18 teams will secure WorldTour status for 2026.

However, with the potential merger of Belgian teams Lotto and Intermarché-Wanty still on the cards for 2026, with both currently positioned in the top 18, 19th position could be enough to secure a WorldTour status for the next cycle, and the battle for it couldn't be much closer.

Full UCI rankings can be found via the links below:

• UCI ranking Men
• UCI ranking Women
• UCI ranking Teams Men
• UCI ranking Teams Women

Position: 15th
Points: 29,450
Points gap to virtual relegation (19th): +3,725

XDS Astana have featured in each edition of the relegation battle update, but after recent results, have now moved up to 15th and ahead of Jayco AlUla in 16th, with bothteams’ WorldTour status firmly secured for the 2026 season.

A remarkable comeback considering the Kazakhstani team sat in 21st position and nearly 5,000 points from safety at the end of 2024.

There are plenty of results over the past month which have contributed to XDS-Astana’s continuous rise, including a 1-3 finish at the Giro della Romagna with Christian Scaroni and Simone Velasco, respectively. German sprinter Max Kanter has also had a strong month with second-place finishes at Omloop van het Houtland and Paris-Chauny.

However, the most profitable race since the Vuelta has to be the Petronas Le Tour de Langkawi, where the team took four stage wins, a hat-trick for Matteo Malucelli and one for Aaron Gate, whilst Nicolas Vinokourov ended fourth on GC.

In the last week, the team have picked up more points at the recent Italian one-day races with third at the Coppa Agostini with Simone Velasco and fifth at Tre Valli Varesine with Sergio Higuita.

The team will now be looking to ensure a strong start to the next UCI World Ranking cycle beginning in 2026, to avoid finding themselves in a similar situation to the start of this year.

Position: 16th
Points: 29,310
Points gap to virtual relegation (19th): +3,585

Featuring for the first time in one of these updates, Jayco AlUla are not at all threatened by relegation, only appearing in this feature due to slipping below XDS Astana into 16th place.

Though the Australian team will need to step things up in 2026 if they want to once again avoid being involved in the conversation for the next cycle.

Position: 17th 
Points: 27,307
Points gap to virtual relegation (19th): +1,582

Another team who can all but breathe a sigh of relief is Picnic PostNL, who sit comfortably in 17th place with sizeable gaps to the teams below them.

Picnic PostNL haven’t been in scintillating form in recent weeks, but the same can be said for the teams around them, and the fact is, the Dutch team did most of their work during late spring and into the Summer, with excellent showings at both the Giro d’Italia and the Tour de France standing out.

The team have achieved three podium places in one-day races since the last update, which scored the team healthy points. All three came in sprints with Pavel Bittner taking third at the Sparkassen Münsterland Giro, Tobias Lund Andersen with second at the Coppa Bernocchi, and finally Nils Eekhoff ended runner-up at Binche-Chimay-Binche.

Position: 18th 
Points: 26,528
Points gap to virtual relegation (19th): +803

With the merger between Lotto and Intermarché-Wanty still in the works, it remains up in the air as to whether 18th or 19th place will present the final golden ticket to the WorldTour for 2026. 

Regardless of whether the merger comes to fruition, one thing is for sure that  Intermarché’s gap over 19th place has shrunk by over 400 points since the last update. Back then, Cofidis was the closest challenger to 18th place, but that has since changed.

Gerben Thijssen was the team’s best points scorer in this period with a 3rd and 5th place finish at Gooikse Pijl and Omloop van het Houtland, two Belgian one-day races. Arne Marit managed a 3rd place finish at the latter, a highlight in what was a quiet month for the Belgian team on the results front.

For Intermarché, it’s unlikely that they will lose the 19th spot, and in all likelihood, it may not matter to the team because of the merger, but the Belgian team will want to end 2025 on a positive note and maintain their 18th position.

Position: 19th
Points: 25,725
Points gap to virtual promotion (18th): -803

At the time of the last update, Uno-X Mobility were on the coattails of Cofidis, who occupied 19th position, which could become the final WorldTour spot due to the Lotto and Intermarché-Wanty’s merger, sitting a minuscule 26 points behind.

However, the Scandinavian team have flipped the scales in their favour in recent weeks and now has a foothold on what seems to be a straight duel with the French team for 19th, and potential WorldTour status.

As has been alluded to throughout each update, Uno-X are unlike any other team in this equation, as the only non-current WorldTour team, meaning that the mentality is different. It’s a promotion battle for Uno-X, illustrating the contrasting momentum, with the Scandinavian team on the up, while it could be argued that teams such as Cofidis are on the decline.

There haven’t been any major results for Uno-X since the last update, but unlike Cofidis, the team have been consistent, scoring twenty-one top 10 finishes, all important for picking up a steady haul of points.

Many of these top 10 finishes came at the Petronas Le Tour de Langkawi, where Erlend Blikra and the now-retired Alexander Kristoff were very competitive in the sprints, whilst Anders Halland Johannessen was runner-up in the general classification.

Johannes Kulset has picked up two 9th-place finishes at Coppa Agostoni and Tre Valli Varesine, whilst Tobias Halland Johannessen was 7th at the latter, rounding out another important period for the team.

Position: 20th
Points: 25,158
Points gap to virtual survival (18th): -1,370

Having been narrowly ahead of Uno-X Mobility in 19th, Cofidis have now slipped to 567 points behind, leaving the French team in an increasingly dire situation, especially considering that 19th only will secure WorldTour status if Lotto and Intermarche-Wanty’s merger goes ahead.

A lack of big results over the last month looks to be costing Cofidis significantly, with only five top 10 finishes since the last relegation battle update.

A significant lifeline for the French team is their remaining schedule of races compared to their Scandinavian rivals. As a current WorldTour team, Cofidis have an automatic invite to the Chinese stage race, the Tour of Guangxi, which Uno-X Mobility haven’t been invited to. As a WorldTour event with 6 stages, the opportunity to score points that Uno-X can’t is simply an opportunity that Cofidis can’t pass up on if they want to retain their WorldTour status.

Position: 21st
Points: 23,081
Points gap to virtual survival (18th): -3,447

It’s been inevitable for some time that the Breton team would lose their WorldTour status, and the focus has been on, in fact, retaining its future existence as a team.

With a majority of the riders, such as Kévin Vauquelin, set to leave the team for 2026, it’s currently difficult to see Arkea-B&B Hotels being featured in an immediate promotion battle in the next UCI rankings cycle, and the main hope is that the team will still exist.

Paris-Chauny was the team’s best race over recent weeks, with a 5th and 9th place combination from Clément Venturini and Luca Mozzato, both of whom are on their way out for 2026, with Mozzato confirmed to Tudor, and Venturini’s destination yet to be confirmed.