Moon Dust and Angel Beams: Practice Two - Val di Sole DH World Champs 2016
It's practice, day two here in Val Di Sole and the Black Snake is turning into a constantly changing beast. Timed runs for the men tomorrow and qualies for the Women and Juniors will give us a better idea of who is riding well. For now, it's more glorious light, fluffy moon dust, and massive holes, as the track takes a pummeling from the riders.
Oh that's just light, bro.
Rachel Atherton, just one win away from a perfect season.
Pompon won here before and has been picking up speed each run.
Tahnee Seagrave takes the inside line in early morning practice.
Manon tearing through the dusty chutes of the lower slopes.
Awesome to see a female Japanese rider turn up to race the Worlds. Mio Suemasa has been on the scene for the best part of a decade but has focused her attention mainly on XC in recent years.
Tracey Hannah has been looking very fast. She is fired up for this one.
"Aggressive" is the only way to describe how Tracey has been riding the past few days.
Brage had a wild off this morning, but tidied things up afterwards.
Elliot Heap, running the rough stuff on the top section.
Gaetan Vige
No head injury for Finn after his massive face plant yesterday. He is going to give it a go tomorrow, despite some very sore ribs - still cautiously optimistic.
Remi Thirion is crushing practice. Full attack mode all the time.
Greg Minnaar taking the high line midway down the track.
Florent Payet diving into another one of Val di Sole's signature switchbacks.
Lauire Greenland is looking dangerous in the gnarliest sections.
Mick Hannah, about to drop into a huge rut that formed in the lower woods.
Remi Thirion, like a boss.
The Redcar Rocket blasting off into the tree canopy on the super sender.
Danny Hart is only here for one result...
Alex Marin takes the inside line down the steep rock garden.
Marcelo Gutierez, powering though the trees for team Colombia.
Troy 'Moses' Brosnan parting the sea of darkness before him, looking crazy pinned.
One more day of sun and Val di Sole is going become a giant sandbox. It's well on the way already.
Danny Hart looks like the fastest man on track.
The Bulldog, smashing his way through the rough stuff.
EWS regular Martin Maes is here racing for Belgium.
Bernard Kerr took to track today after Gee Atherton backed out of the race due to injury.
Neko Mulally has been on form this week.
Greg Williamson scrubs a little rock kicker on one of the faster parts of the track.
The White Knight was pinned all day today.
Amaury Pierron cuts through the dust.
Bryceland, through the off-camber sandbox.
Jack Moir, surfing hot air thermals in the forest.
Supreme props to this guy.
Luca Shaw, keeping things nice and neat in practice. He will bring the speed come race day.
Loic has been cranking out fast run after fast run - definitely in the hunt for one a medal this weekend.
When the going gets steep, Adam Brayton goes HAM.
Greg Minnaar, powering through the ragged turns like he means it.
Mark Wallace grips and rips coming into the steepest section of Val Di Sole.
Connor Fearon takes the wide line through the rock garden.
Loris Vergier floating over the gnar.
Rachel keeping cool in the midday heat.
George Brannigan wraps up a buck wild day at VDS fully stoked.
Jordi has been chained to his work stand all day. Jordi is sad. Jordi needs a beer. Someone give Jordi a beer.
Charlie Harrison had a rough one today and was icing his shoulder in the pits most of the afternoon.
Two absolute legends right here, and we could be seeing the final race from one of them on Sunday.
Gold... The color on everyone's mind this week.
Evan gives Troy's fork a bit of love.
Some solid finish jump inspiration for any riders crashing on their race runs this Sunday...
Val di Sole organizers put on a Freestyle Moto show today after the training sessions.
Beno and Logan are on wheel duty - as are most mechanics.
Brage's family are all in Val Di Sole for Worlds.
After a long and colorful career, Formula's Brake Meister "Otto" announced his retirement today. Ciao, Otto. Grazzie Luciano Villano. We hope to see you around the races in the future.
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why does he have "A" on his number plate
Of course he isn't going to retire, Steve Peat is going to stay on the scene and josh will still race. He won the WC 2 years ago, he's having a bad patch but he's still one of the best riders on the planet.
When vital posted a photo of JB in a gondal with his helmet and camera with the caption "possibly the last chance we'll see this" josh retweeted with the question "why, and I not allowed to have a camera on my helmet anymore?"
It's all rubbish that has stemmed from internet runouring.
The "sport" is not an entity, please stop insinuating that UCI and bike companies are scheming to make money by breaking athletes' bones.
@cmcrawfo: He is an adult, he can make his own decisions. You still haven't explained how the UCI is more capable at making his healthcare decisions than he is, other than your baseless corrupt doctor conspiracies. What about personal responsibility to you abhor so much? I'm sincerely not trying to attack you, I'm trying to understand why you want bureaucrats to make personal decisions for adults?
And Finn is still an infant at law.
Only a doctor (specialy a neurologist) knows that...
The UCI should have rules about this things...they should demand a certain degree of protection in the helmets, like a UCI-DH helmet certification.
Athletes cannot be responsible for deciding when they can compete after a head injury. Besides not being qualified, they have so much pressure with sponsors and their drive to perform well as a top guy, not a lot can stop these winners, especially not an injury they don't feel at the moment.
The problem is, after his brains been sloshed around after that wreck (the hemet clearly shows) another small impact soon after can be deviststating. Compound blows to the head is where you start to really see perminant damage. Ask Dave Mirra or Junior Seau how it worked out for them...
The thing about concussions is that they impair your judgement. It's impossible to self diagnose. You need a fully functioning brain to tell you whether you're OK or not, and people with concussions don't have fully functioning brains.
They cannot be trusted to make the right decisions on their own behalf, and if you've ever seen someone with a concussion who can't remember how to tie their shoelaces insisting that they're still ok to ride the black runs you would realise this.
they have even more interviews with riders about tire selection on youtube - www.youtube.com/user/DirtMountainbikeTV/videos?sort=dd&shelf_id=26&view=0
1st Aaron Gwin
2nd Danny Hart
3rd Greg Minnaar
Women :
1st Rachel Atherton
2nd Tracey Hannah
3rd Manon Carpenter