Eagle Park Race Report 1st & 2nd October 2011 -

: 2011 South Australian State Champ Troy Brosnan

The 2011 South Australian State Champs were held at Eagle Mountain bike park on the long weekend. This would be a good shake-down event before the 2012 National Champs are held here and interstate riders made the trek over to get some extra practice on the course.

downhill247.com — Luke Ellison third in Under 19's railing the berms near the bottom of the course.

Saturday’s practice was an interesting day due to the crazy weather. One minute you were sweating in the sun, the next minute you were getting drenched in rain. This meant track conditions were constantly changing, some of the rocks lining the course would get slippery once wet and mud was dragged onto them. However, when the course dried out a little the conditions were excellent for the riders. The track used followed the course used for the 2011 National Champs and this gives a good indication of what might be used for the 2012 track. Riders got close to going underA�two minutes but still no one cracked the sub 2 minute barrier.

: Marcus Fairbanks came from Victoria for the race and would have given it a real crack in finals but had a crash that put him off the pace.

It would be hard to look past Troy Brosnan for the win in Elite but it wasn’t all one way traffic for him, Connor Fearon seeded fastest in the morning. Furthermore, with a few quick Victorian riders around and Henry Blake on his new bike riding well it was on for the race!

For the Under 19’s the battle between Angus Maddern and Cam Ryan looked set to continue. These two have been riding super well all year and it was hard to even guess a winner! The only thing to do was race! Conditions were good for racing and it was Angus Maddern who took the win, keeping his slight edge over Cam winning by just under 2 seconds.

The main event of the day was the Elite Men’s race, some of the fast South Australian locals, such as Steve Gebert, set the pace early. Once Marcus Fairbanks crashed out of contention there was a fair chance the winner was going to come from one of the top 3 juniors at the club, Henry Blake, Connor fearon or Troy Brosnan. Henry Blake came down with a scorching time and took the hot seat, only to be outed a few riders later by Troy Brosnan who took five seconds off Henry’s time. This left Connor on the hill, unfortunately he washed out on a corner and finished down the list.

The next big race at Eagle will be National Champs from the 23rd to the 26th of February 2012, downhill247.com will be there to cover the event.