This time Polygon UR´s Andrew Neethling teams up with his young team mate Remy 'Rem Dawg' Morton. Let´s check out if Needles can keep up while talking you down the glorious hill here in Schladming. Should be a funny weekend!
I don't think you can beat Claudio from an entertainment and laughter perspective, but Needles done a great job there. Commentary from a World Cup riders perspective gives you a different insight to what Claudio provides, perhaps describing the track in more detail. I don't suppose a lot of people know how difficult it is to commentate live whilst riding; give it a go next time you're ripping down your local trail. From my personal experience and considering my fitness levels, i'm huffing and puffing a 1/3 down Fort William and thats without the commentary. Just shows you how fit and switched on these guys are compared to your average rider. I hope to see more of these commentaries over the course of the season. Thanks Claudio/Needles and to all you other guys just giving that little extra to provide us at home a better viewing experience.
Claudio set a high standards for those videos, but in my opinion, Andrew did a grat job! I know how hard is to ride and commentate cause I did similar video before national competiotion. Sometimes it was hard to say a word. However I decided o make such a videos.
andrew blows claudio outta the water with a much better job of track preview.
i got a feeling andrew would destroy in the booth doing color, way better than claudio.
claudio is a one trick pony, and his trick is getting old..............
He's way more informative than Claudio, who just screams and yells random stuff all the time. Yes, it's impressive that he (Claudio) can ride these courses this fast on his first run, but I don't think his commentary is very interesting, it's just way overhyped.
Same for Warner's and his commentary in the live feed, it's not just that I'm missing the drunk Warner screaming into the mic, I'm pretty sure he did a lot more background research back then, because he knew a lot more about every rider, the last few rounds these guys missed so much that was happening, I was watching the screen and thinking "how can they not see this right now" all the time.
I still give the nod to Claudio. He's always blurting out something interesting. No dead air or awkward silence trying to think of something to say the way everyone else who tries it does.
its funny, when you talk to world cup downhill ski racers, they will tell you they love to watch mtb wc dh, but they always say or mention how the course check dude(claudio) brings the sport down. makes it look so kooky and wacky......
the ski racers are split on warner, some think hes refreshing and casual, others again, think he brings the sport down, or another way to say it would be that the sport is hard and gnarly that it deserves 'more professionalism'.
no stacky, its cos skiing has a HUUUGE fanbase compared to mtb, who generally have a lot more money to spend on shit. DH skiing is boring as hell to watch and far too corporate, big money slogans everywhere. The longer mtb can stay away from the stale boredom of dh skiing the better
No, @krsh, I'm saying I hope it doesn't become boring and homogonised. If more money means no fun (eg Claudios course checks) then the money can piss off.
Is this the same schladming course they used for the World Cup races? If so, why is this track always held up as some sort of gold standard of tracks? Whenever there is a shitty track that people complain about, like South Africa or Leogang in the past, I'd see comment after comment about bringing back 'real DH tracks' like schladming. Am I missing something? It looks like a super awesome track and looks very steep but hardly the pinnacle of gnarliness that people seem to make it out to be.
It's not that it's the pinnacle of gnarliness (that award most likely goes to Val di Sole) but that it's the combination of so many awesome things all on one track- insane steepness, totally gnarly wooded sections, sculpted corners, balls out speed, perfect jumps, and amazing dirt (no kitty litter or gravel bs). You will have to ride here to understand just how steep, technical, and awesome it really is. Extremely talented guys like Needles (combined with a helmet cam flattening out everything) just make it look easy. For example, the very first thing you hit rolling out of the starting gate is 10 ft gap with about a 15 ft drop that feels like you fell down an elevator shaft- he's not kidding in the audio. But it's something that you hardly notice on their helmet cam. It's just one of the many awesome things about the course here that makes every WC racer says it's one of the greatest tracks in the history of downhill.
release the beast spannnk the monkey. and then you see angelfire. come on america grt's look like european enduro compared to this beast oh spank the monkey again!
Yes, it's impressive that he (Claudio) can ride these courses this fast on his first run, but I don't think his commentary is very interesting, it's just way overhyped.
Same for Warner's and his commentary in the live feed, it's not just that I'm missing the drunk Warner screaming into the mic, I'm pretty sure he did a lot more background research back then, because he knew a lot more about every rider, the last few rounds these guys missed so much that was happening, I was watching the screen and thinking "how can they not see this right now" all the time.
the ski racers are split on warner, some think hes refreshing and casual, others again, think he brings the sport down, or another way to say it would be that the sport is hard and gnarly that it deserves 'more professionalism'.
hmmmmmmmmmmmm.
the racing is gnarly.
they could care less what you think, they are to busy counting the world class paychecks after they win on the world cup.dolla dolla bill yall.
what do you think dh mtb payouts are like on race day?
not even close to what alpine racers make, and ya wanna know why..................?
image and presentation to the masses pays.large.
kitzbuhl is boring and corporate?
More outside sponsors means more money in sport, more money means more races. More races more fun. Why is that a bad thing?
Needles = educational
enjoyed both equally
hope there will be more of that!