looks like I missed this article featuring veloman himself. I just summarize the highlights:
> he's from London, 46 years of age.
> founded in 1997 where you e-mailed your picks to him, American Lance fans were the first big group to play it
> shut down for 2 years because ASO went after him for copyright infringement. ASO even invited him to the final stage in Paris, as a sort of apology and recognition.
> Yellow, pink or red? - Pink
> I'm not much of a cyclist myself - more of a couch potato and nerdy fan. I've never even had a proper road bike.
> The second year coincided with the Festina scandal and the sit-down protests. The system for what happens when a stage is cancelled or neutralised, or a rider gets disqualified, was set back then
>  Pogačar was 34 credits last year, which was well worth it because he broke the 4,000-points barrier. He was picked by 74% of players so I might put him on 36
> I've made some huge mistakes in the past. The biggest was Puck Pieterse, who I only valued at four credits a couple of years ago because she came from cyclo-cross and had no road results.
> Players are about 30% Britain, 30% US and 40% everywhere else - primarily Canada, Australia and New Zealand. It's popular in Portugal and France. There's even a podcast about it in Brazil.
and how to win velogames:
> It's not really an exact science. For Grand Tours, you need two of the top three on GC, plus the best sprinter, then value for money elsewhere.
full interview here:
https://www.cyclingweekly.com/news/trademark-tussles-scoring-systems-and-pricing-pogacar-how-one-man-built-a-30-000-player-fantasy-cycling-game