It's definitely safe to say that the World Cup calendar has gotten a bit routine over the past few years, with the same venues and same tracks getting repeated with little or no deviation from what looks to be a fairly set schedule. While each venue and each race track certainly lives up to the task at hand, some do it better than others, and Mont-Sainte-Anne is one of the latter.
Like a fine wine, Mont Sainte Anne has aged for the better and each year it seems just that much more refined than the last. While many riders will admit to struggling here, you will rarely hear of anyone complaining. It is fast, it is scary, it is everything a DH track should be, and for these reasons Mont Sainte Anne is often the race riders look forward to the most.
Having been a mainstay on the WC circuit since the early 1990s, no other venue has played host to top-level racing for as long or had as much influence over the direction of the sport. In 1996, when DH tracks were still mostly fast pedally fire roads and the occasional steep ski slope, Mont-Sainte-Anne decided to completely break the mold. The result was a track that we still follow almost in its entirety today, with only a few changes made each year to evolve alongside the sport it helped to progress. That original track was so long, so rough, and so technical that it achieved legendary status almost overnight. Winning a World Cup was and still is extremely prestigious, but winning Mont-Sainte-Anne is considered the cherry on top.
Whoever wins here this weekend will join a list of previous winners made up of the who's who of close to three generations of mountain bikers. Names like John Tomac, Missy Giove, Nico Vouilloz, Greg Minnaar, Rachel Atherton, Steve Peat, Aaron Gwin, and of course, Stevie Smith.
MENTIONS: @davetrump / @natedh9 /
@mdelorme
Doesn't that say that Mont-Sainte Anne doesn't do it as well as others?
lol, my brain broke on this too
former = "some"
latter = "others"
In other words, some do it better than Mont-Sainte-Anne
Former = all do it sufficiently
Latter = of those some do it better than others
MSA is the latter
Don't worry, we still love ya. The article and photos are awesome!
Mike Jones: "This is outrageous, we'll be doing 80mph through here. That's your rotors gone in one run."
"It's definitely safe to say that the World Cup calendar has gotten a bit routine over the past few years, with the same venues and same tracks getting repeated with little or no deviation from what looks to be a fairly set schedule. While each venue and each race track certainly lives up to the task at hand, some do it better than others, and Mont-Sainte-Anne is one of the latter."
you f*cking what fam!?