Contador debuts at third in latest WorldTour standings

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Upon the conclusion of Tirreno-Adriatico, the third round of the UCI WorldTour, Carlos Betancur (AG2R La Mondiale) continues to lead the overall standings with 114 points, all earned during his victory at Paris-Nice. The 24-year-old Colombian is tied on points with Tour Down Under winner Simon Gerrans (Orica GreenEdge) at 114, but the AG2R La Mondiale rider gets the nod as WorldTour leader due to the tie breaker of having won two stages at Paris-Nice versus the Australian's one stage win at the Tour Down Under.

Tirreno-Adriatico winner Alberto Contador (Tinkoff-Saxo) debuts in the WorldTour rankings in third place with 112 points. Fourth and fifth place are held by Cadel Evans (BMC) and world champion Rui Costa (Lampre-Merida), each having accumulated 88 points in WorldTour events thus far this season. Evans' points were all earned at the Tour Down Under, where he finished second overall plus won a stage and placed third in another. Costa's points were all from Paris-Nice where he finished second overall and placed second on two consecutive stages.

2013 WorldTour winner Joaquim Rodriguez (Katusha) has yet to contest a WorldTour race thus far in 2014, but he'll line up against a very deep field this coming Monday to contest the Volta Ciclista a Catalunya stage race in Spain, the fifth WorldTour event of the season following the one-day Classic Milan-San Remo held the previous day.

The WorldTour nations classification leader continues to be Australia with 336 points. However, after Australia’s super-strong start to the season other countries are beginning to close the gap. Colombia has moved into second with 248 points while Spain moved from sixth up to third with 206 points.

AG2R La Mondiale is the new leader in the team classification having moved up two spots from third to first with 216 points. Tinkoff-Saxo, due to Contador and Roman Kreuziger at Tirreno-Adriatico, debut in second place with 183 points while Lampre-Merida drops from first to third with 171 points.

Movistar, the winner of the 2013 WorldTour team classification, moved from eighth to fourth overall at 158 points while Orica-GreenEdge, the top-ranked team following the Tour Down Under, slots in at fifth place with 153 points.