Seeding – WC#1 – Pietermaritzburg

As predicted Troy Brosnan was Australia's fastest seeder at the first World Cup of the year, he seeded in fifth place, 2.27 seconds behind fastest seeder, local Greg Minnaar.

The World Cup season has kicked off in mainly sunny South Africa, the field is not that large obviously due to the location but after all this is the World series. 159 men and 27 women signed up for the race, seeding has been run and the results are in:

Elite Men:

1. Greg Minnaar 3.59.62

2. Aaron Gwin 3.59.63 + 0.01

3. Stevie Smith 4.00.49 + 0.87

4. Gee Atherton 4.01.39 + 1.77

5. Troy Brosnan 4.01.89 + 2.27

…

6. Mic Hannah 4.04.01 + 4.39

9. Jared Graves 4.05.53 + 5.91

14. Sam Hill 4.06.81 + 7.19

18. Bryn Atkinson 4.08.45 + 8.83

38. Mitch Delfs 4.13.72 + 14.10

49. Connor Fearon 4.16.92 + 17.30

No surprises to see local Greg Minnaar topping the time sheets, shortly followed by Aaron Gwin. Aaron stopped pedalling on the last straight and coasted, enough to cover the 0.01 seconds he qualified second behind Greg.

Fastest qualifier, just, Greg Minnaar was holding it wide open in qualifying, you can bet the crowd will be cheering him on come finals.

TheA�women’s qualifying proved what we were all hoping/knew, Tracey Hannah is back! She qualified first by over 3.5 seconds.

Elite Women:

1. Tracey Hannah 4.36.85

2. Emmeline Ragot 4.40.41 + 3.56

3. Floriane Pugin 4.40.51 + 3.66

4.A�Sabrina JonnierA�4.40.84 + 3.98

5. Jill Kintner 4.43.29 + 6.44

This should give you a hint as to what the tracks like, pedally! Here Marc Beaumont and his (custom?) Fox unit.
Gee Atherton came out with a point to prove for his new sponsors, no surprises he qualified fourth on such a pedally track.
A lot of people are watching Brendan Fairclough and his move to a new team, where he is the lead rider. 31st in qualifying.
Twelfth in qualifying for Danny Hart, he is keeping up to his reputation as being a style master though!
49th for Connor Fearon, on a track that won't be a favourite this year. Connor is hoping to crack the top 35 come finals.
Fourteenth for Sam Hill in qualifying, you know he wants to crack the top five, at least, come finals.

Check back for a finals report soon. The weather is forecast to rain this weekend, will it and if so what will this do to the results?

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