The 2013 World Cup Season seems to have clicked up a notch every round. With an ever-growing intensity of crowds, weather, hype and action, Mont Saint Anne was no exception. Wild weather seemed to hang eerily over the Canadian resort throughout the four day event, only adding to the drama come race day. Here Stevie Smith has the finish in sight, powering in for the win.
For many Australian fans this was one early Monday morning to look forward to; a 5am start with the Top 10 Women’s DHI streamed on Red Bull TV. While Rachel Atherton has dominated the series so far, and qualified first, an error at the top of the course and a crash in the lower wooded section cost her vital time, and landed her in 12th place. Emmiline Ragot came away with the win by 4 seconds with a fast, clean run ahead of Manon Carpenter and Floriane Pugin.
Emmiline Ragot took the win with style, and with Junior Men’s teammate Loris Vergier taking 1st too, it was a great day for the Lapierre Gravity Republic team on the mountain.
As the Men’s race runs got underway, mechanicals and punctures littered the field, and even an unlucky broken wheel for ‘not Peaty’ Josh Bryceland. South African Andrew Neethling still held the hot seat with a time of 4:02:984, which held well into the Top 30, until Gee Atherton stormed through for the final dry run of the day with a 3:59:389. Then the sky opened up to make things interesting. It wasn’t long before the open areas were getting slick, slowing riders down in the top section and seemingly securing the win for Gee.
After proving his worth in previous years as a Junior, Troy Brosnan has his foot firmly in the door, placing pressure on the world’s fastest and doing Australia proud. After qualifying 7th, Troy laid down a solid performance in his race run, but the change in conditions slowed the whole group down.After a solid weekend of practice, and confidence coming into the event, Dean Lucas took a close second in Junior Mens, three hundredths of a second behind Loris Vergier. It’s easy to believe the future of Australian World Cup downhill is in safe hands watching these young guns ride!There’s no doubt that there were hearts in mouths when Sam Hill stepped up to the start. After his mythical performance at Champery in 2007, and his building performance throughout his first season back from injury, it was very plausible that he could steal the win from under Gee’s nose. Once again the wet weather stood its ground, but Sam put up a good fight to claim 3rd. And the words on Australia’s lips are “one of these days…”As Stevie Smith hit the track the home crowd roared; they roared as if they’d been silent all day. As he made his way down the mountain, with obvious speed and endless style, commentator Rob Warner took us back to Champery 2011, and got the Downhill world’s hearts pumping as Stevie came in with a time of 3:58:485 and the win.The grin of a well deserved winner, Steve Smith hasn’t got long to celebrate before heading to Whistler for Crankworx. It’s on with the job and onto the next race, but this win won’t be forgotten quickly.
The whole field is hungry for the top of the podium, and as the season progresses each rider gets even more determined. What will happen in Norway?
What a shambles! High speed winds ripped through overnight and caused some damage.
Everyone in Mont Sainte Anne woke up for the finalA�full day of practice to be greeted by a bit of destruction! Strong winds that came through overnight really made a mess of the pit area! For the riders the winds did cause a few issues in practice, one of the fastest courses on the circuit, MSA has some open areas and jumps where the wind can play havoc, keeping it low was the name of the game.
For the riders keeping low over jumps was critical, with a good qualifying result Sam Blenkinsop keeps it low to make sure he makes it through to Sunday’s race.Keeping low doesn’t mean you can’t look stylish though as Sam Hill demonstrates!The Santa Cruz Syndicate didn’t escape the carnage…Good thing none of the team bikes were there/damaged otherwise we couldn’t have got this banger of Greg Minnaar!Danny Hart will be wanting to get the ‘no World Cup win’ monkey off his back, second in qualifying shows this could be his race.There were plenty of different styles being thrown down over the jumps lining the course…
Will Gee Atherton’s big crash in qualifying be too much for him to overcome on race day? Connor Fearon is on a mission for a top 10 result and we all know he can do it! Will Sam Hill take his first win in a long time? Will Danny Hart claim his maiden victory? Troy Brosnan knows this track and won his first Junior World Champs here, with his parents support track side, will he take his maiden victory? So many questions – race day will answer all, check back soon!
A promising 2013 season and 6th in Qualifying suggests this will be a big weekend for Hill. He’s got the speed, can he pull it off?
Qualifying went well for Aussie riders with 6th for Sam and 9th for Troy Brosnan. Mitch Delfs and Bryn Atkinson rode 19th and 21st respectively, meaning plenty of Australian talent at the top end of the competition. Fastest on the day for the DHI class were Stevie Smith and Rachel Atherton. While the trail dries out and the weekend gets ever closer, the anticipation is building. Another event in an epic season of World Cup racing!
Qualifying one second ahead of Danny Hart, Stevie is showing his speed but still has to fight for the win on home soil.Rachel Atherton is looking unstoppable this season with 3 wins from 3 races, first in qualifying means she is again the rider to beat!That hip! Mic Hannah qualified 7th, showing he will be in the mix come Sunday.Just behind Mic was Troy Brosnan in 9th on one of the schmickest looking bikes on the circuit, can anyone say baller?! Troy won his first World Champs here and has the support of his parents at the race this weekend, could this be his first victory?Mitch Delfs snuck in to the top 20 with a 19th place, primed for a big result no doubt.A big Aussie contingent is on the ground this weekend, including junior Jackson Davis, who pulled out a super strong 15th in qualifying.
Rain has again fallen here in MSA after initially looking dry, so with that comes another set of challenges. Check back soon.
Round 4 of the UCI World Cup is underway, after some incredible weather wednesday night the trail was slick for the first day of practice.
A stop on the UCI World Cup since 1991 (more commonly known as the beginning of MTB time), Mont St Anne is a well raced track. The natural track changes dramatically from top to bottom with tight, rocky wooded sections (with fresh ruts) that lead into gnarly steeps and fast open straights. What will the weekend bring?
It’s not all bad news though, Thursday afternoon showed promise of a drier weekend. Here Dirt/Norco team rider George Gannicott (IRE) soaking up the sunshine.Sik Mik was feeling the mud during practice, but went well in timed practice. With plenty of Aussie support for Mik and Tracey, this weekend will be a nailbiter!Did we mention the mud?
Rock gardens and punctures aplenty, the woods won’t be so quiet when the crowds get there in a couple of days. For now, they’re a thinking space for riders getting their lines together.
After round 2 at Val di Sole there was a 5 week gap in races. I took this time to head
back to Australia and dig into some training, eat a lot of Chicken Parmigianaa��s and
do heaps of Go Karting. By the time I flew back to Europe for Andorra world cup I
felt I was a lot stronger, fitter and ready to continue the season.
Nobody really knew what to expect of the track in Vallnord. There were rumours of it being steep, long, technical and also physical. After walking the track on the Wednesday it was apparent that the rumours where true. The course was very long, steep, rough, fast and technical. I liked the look of the track except the first section which was very flat and had you sprinting for the first 40 seconds of your run. When the first day of practice rolled around the track was pretty wet from the heavy rain it received leading up to the event. Some sections of track where so slippery you could hardly brake or steer down them.
Qualifying was on Friday and I had been feeling really good on the track. It hadna��t rained at all so the course was drying up and getting almost dusty which I preferred. In my qualifying run everything was working well until about halfway down when my hands where cramped so badly due to arm pump I was reduced to just crawling down the track. I didna��t have this problem in practice because I would stop 2 or 3 times a run. I qualified 63rd which is my worst qualifying result by far in the 3 seasons I have competed in.
On Saturday my mechanic and I worked on changes to help me down the track. We changed the settings on my suspension a lot to try and make it easier for my Hands! I walked the track on Saturday as well and scoped out some smoother lines which might be a little slower but in the long run would make me go faster. On Sunday my practice was good and the track was dry and dusty in sections which made for a really fast course. I knew if as long as I could hold on I could get a good result here.
The crowd is always loud on a WC race day, but Connor is quietly focused, on the job.
My plan for my runs was to make as much time up at the top of the track before my hands got cramped. This seemed to work pretty well for me. My final run was fast, the track had changed quite a lot since my last practice run so I had to guess what to expect in some sections. I finished in 34th position, which was good considering my qualifying result and I didna��t lose to many points for the overall.
Next race is Mont St Anne which I have done well at in the past. At the moment Ia��m already in Bromont, QuebecA� spending a lot of time on my bike getting prepared to get a great result there in two weeks!
Last minute practice for riders before finals! Check out the drop to the finish line, that’s steep!
Wow who picked that?! World Cup number three delivered a huge range of highs and lows, a classic race and one that really stood out. Lets rewind a little to Sunday morning, the weather A�was inclement and people were still unsure what would happen with it later in the day, as it turned out conditions were near perfect.
Sunnies on! Bryn Atkinson was just a spectator – which as a racer is never the best but with an injury at Val di Sole he was sub par in the health department and at this level being less than 100% means you might not be in the big show come Sunday.
It was the juniors who kicked proceedings off, a shame that there were no Australian Junior females present and only a few males but such are the demands of racing a whole season it is just not viable.
Tahnee Seagrave taking the Junior Female win and sporting the World Cup leaders jersey as she does so.Junior Men’s winner – Michael Jones kept it upright which was half the battle for the junior riders, some stacking literally insight of the line…Loris Vergier may have been the unlucky junior to crash literally within an arms length of the finish beam… Well yes it was him, devastating for him considering he was second by less than half a second!Our juniors still did us proud, Luke Ellison pulled a strong 7th place and after catching two other riders Dean Lucas finished 9th. Dean retains the overall leaders jersey heading into round 4.
The Elite Men put on one heck of a show, there were a few moments that were not nice to see, the most notably Cam Cole crashing hard and having to be airlifted out. Cam is a nice guy, with time for everyone and has had a bad run of luck with injuries over the past few seasons, we wish him all the best! Mic Hannah scored a flat up on course and as he said the realisation that your tyre is deflating when you are giving it everything is never nice! Big news of course is that Cedric Gracia chose his home World Cup to retire, a true legend but one we will still be seeing more of in the future outside of the World Cup circuit.
A bit of style off the end of what must be one of the best quality construction pieces in a World Cup for some time!Yeah David! 58th for David McMillan against the best racers in the world is pretty awesome for a privateer giving it a real go!Unstoppable! Rachel Atherton was really pushed by Manon Carpenter but still took the win, three from three – can anyone stop her?!Aaron Gwin finished 10th on his bigger bike but after the domination he has shown in the past two season that is a low result by his standards – crazy a top ten at a World Cup is a low result but it shows the pressure these guys are under.Another threat at any race, in any condition, on any track – Greg Minnaar, one spot off the podium in 6th place.34th for Connor Fearon, a strong result but the weekend didn’t quite go to plan for him, wait for his Inside Info where he will give you more insight to his race.The crowd were crazy! So were the media – in their own special way, it is a huge mission to bring you guys the coverage we do believe us!So close! Last rider down and the rider many picked to take the win! Sam Hill missed out just, 3rd place but steadily climbing up the rankings every race and with Troy Brosnan rounding out the podium in 5th place it was a good race as far as us Aussies were concerned.Qualifying proved it wasn’t our eyes playing tricks on us, Remi Thirion was the fastest! What a result for the young Frenchman, congratulations.Cedric Gracia showing the love! Nice one all.
Elite Men:
1. Remi Thirion 4.13.66
2. Gee Atherton 4.15.016 + 1.350
3. Sam Hill 4.15.422 + 1.756
4. Steve Smith 4.15.939 + 2.273
5. Troy Brosnan 4.16.142 + 2.476
The next round in a few weeks time is the infamous Mont Saint Anne – join us there!
