Val di Sole - Course Walk and Pit Check
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 Christoph Eichinger piloting the XC Bandit Central Haibike Camper Van/Pit to Val di Sole from Munich. Traveling through the alps means lots of tunnels; claustrophobic passengers and drivers need not apply. |
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| All roads lead to Rome. But not in this part of Italy. But one does lead to the World Cup Finals at Valle di Sole. |
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| Tuesday evening a large amount of teams had already moved in and setup. Val Di Sole living up to to its name. |
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| Check the beading on the welds of this Santa Cruz V-10. Spotless, right? That's because that would be a nice bit of Carbon Newness for the Syndicate boys. That's right, Santa Cruz has gone full carbon on the V-10. |
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| An 8 inch rotor is 203mm and provides gobs of stopping power. So what do you get if you're a black box racer on a stupidly steep track? 220mm. Or 8.66 inches. Maybe that's overkill, but then again, the guy who wins rarely complains about having too much braking power. |
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| Bikes get a full head to toe before being re-built. Ricky Bobby, Peaty's wrench, gives the steerer on Mr Peat's steed a sharp eye. The crown race, he eventually decided, needed replacing. It's almost obsessive attention to detail like this that makes this team so damn good. |
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| Val di Sole sees the return of Santa Cruz Syndicate's Dougie Fresh, one of the more storied wrenches on the circuit. Given how hard Rat boy was on his Bash guards last year here, Doug's already retro fitting an extra guard onto Bryceland's swing arm. |
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| Given the roots and rocks on this track, mechanics in the know are already lacing up sets of replacement wheels. Paul Miles of Giant Factory Racing is tucked away in the zen moment of building the perfect wheel. To house music. |
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| Blenki's Mechanic, Jack, is likewise knee deep in a wheel build. In fact, nearly every DH team pit has someone tasked with nothing more than lacing up at least 2 extra sets of wheels. This place eats them like candy. |
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| It rained yesterday, but the duff is so thick and dry that it soaked it all up in no time, leaving the track loose and a bit dusty. Add in how steep this track is and it's no wonder that Luke Strobel 's cutting down a set of Schwalbe Dirty Dans for tomorrow's practice. |
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| Racing here means a lot of prep work, and not all of it to the bike or on the bike., but rather fine tuning the engine. And tuning that up means a visit to the MS-Evil Pits and an appointment with Martin the Masseur. There's no one more capable of a physio on the circuit. |
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| Mitch Delfs has forked over his hard earned dough for the privilage of racing here in Val di Sole, and picks up his number plates and such . |
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| The Start. |
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| The course walk starts with safety first. |
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| Troy Brosnan gets up close and personal with the local wildlife. |
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| The course saw a few tweaks--the typical nip here, tuck there--but mostly seems to be composed of rocks, roots, and the occasional Utah white gangster rapper. |
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| Yup. Roots. Rocks. Repeat. |
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| The one flavor of this track--other than roots and rocks--is sustained loss of elevation. This bitch is steep, as the Ozzie National DH army demonstrates. |
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| The track has an old school feel to it with the distinct lack of man made berms, booters. etc. It's just big and rough. And bloody steep. |
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| It's deceptive, but there is a massive G-out here that is going to wreak havoc on lesser riders. |
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| Avoid the orange bits here. Unfortunately, they are right in "the" line, and while they look widely spaced, just add warp speed and brake pumped arms and mix well with blown rims; in short order you realize they are not spaced as far apart as you'd like. |
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| Matt Scoles mentally threading the needle as he gazes down the piste. |
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| These french XC bandits seem a bit lost. Take a wrong turn, mates? |
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| This message makes no sense... |
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| ...unless you meet the course designer's dog, Teo. He pees on that rock every time down the track. |
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| Ahhh, Gwin's Gap is the name of this natural booter. Speculation was rampant as to whether or not he'd have won here last year had he not gone off the bike on the landing. |
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| The booter up above--the one that took out Sam Hill--is no longer part of the track; rather the riders will now have an off-camber right turn at warp speed to contend with. Stated Chris Ball, the UCI's technical DH delegate, "Every year there was a spectacular crash here. After some discussion, we decided we simply didn't need that anymore. But we didn't want to make too easy." |
Stay tuned for more action all weekend from Val di Sole!
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The rotor doesn't affect the breaking power or am I wrong? The break got the same power at 160mm or 200mm, the only difference is the increasing temperature. This affects the breaking power.
So far so right?
Generally manufacturers spec the smallest possible rotor on consumer bikes because less material mean lesser costs and lighter claimed bike weights, most people are not descending Val Di Solle so do not need 220 mm rotors and larger rotors are more likely to contact a rock or other obstacle and be damaged during one's race run/ ride down a track in a bike park.
Thanks guys