Our latest contributor, Jase Stevens, was on the ground over the weekend at the first round of the VicDH series, here is what he had to say;

Welcome to Mt. Taylor, Round 1 of the Victorian Downhill State Series, the weather came to town this weekend to help us kick off the season in style. Nothing but blue skies all weekend, which had only one thing on everyonea��s mind; dust. There were riders strewn across the track through practice simply waiting for the dust to settle.

Once the dust settled the track was ready to get nasty, throughout practice the track became more rutted and increasingly rough, forcing riders through lines they’d perhaps not try, in some cases there was no other option.

The track is really a spectatora��s dream, plenty to see, but she is a long one, taking me almost 3hrs to stroll up and watch along the way. There are as usual some choice spots to watch the action from though, the first rock roller was a great place, some coming in with flats from the previous rock garden. The track was ready to destroy bikes irrelevant of conditions or speed.

With so many line choices through this section the lower section took a real beating in early practice, making the section slightly lower absolute peril come time for race runs.

With so many rocky sections throughout the entire course crashes and mechanicals were inevitable. The radios were a buzz with calls of riders needing a lift from track points due to flats, broken rims, derailleurs and broken people.

After a trip down the hill to avoid being taken out by more bikes I went for a wander around the pits, the rather sizable pits with so many teams this season. We dropped by to see Clint White Racing and helped decorate their Zerode.

Then it was off to the last big double jump on the track, word was they boys were getting wild on the longest double in the last runs of practice. It was definitely worth investigating. It was one of those shows where some whips are so filthy you just forget to push the shutter button.

When racing came about I was stuck in two minds, I knew the a�?cabbage patcha�� was going to be just silly with some of the elite guys coming down but I wanted to take my chances up top, as it turned out the choice was a well guided one. As the seeding runs began, everyone stepped it up another notch and the holes that had been dug in practice suddenly didn’t count as everyone was carrying enough speed to float over them.

The move was inevitable, I had to watch the elite guys come through the cabbage patch on their race runs. Surprisingly enough, I was not alone.

Then it was on, riders started pouring through the cabbage patch, every rider having to navigate a slightly different route as the rocks tumbled and rolled all over the shop.

The racing was excellent and in many cases super tight, with the U/19 1^st and 2^nd being separated by only 0.178 seconds. After such a demanding run the final pedal was torturous for all the riders.

We finished the day with the following results:

Elite Men:

1^st Connor Fearon

2^nd Joey Vejvoda

3^rd Liam Panozzo

4^th Dean Lucas

5^th Tim Eaton

 

Elite Women:

1^st Sarah Booth

2^nd Jacqui Lovett

3^rd Tegan Maloy

4^th Alyssa Lyons

5^th Kelly Bayliss

 

U/19 Men:

1^st Andrew Crimmins

2^nd Aiden Varley

3^rd Ben Hill

4^th Oliver Zwar

5^th Jackson Armitage

 

We really couldn’t have asked for a better way to start the season off down here in the Vic DH series. A really big thanks to the organisers and volunteers at the race, and of course all the racers for showing up!

Looking forward to the next round and the rest of the season! Don’t be shy, come and say hi! We don’t bite!

Jase, signing out for now!

All images and words in this article are credited to Jason Stevens, to see some more of his fantastic work follow this link;

http://www.flickr.com/photos/jason_stevens_photography/