Greg Minnaar is the 2013 DH World Champion, throwing down a scorching run to defend his title on home soil, with Mick Hannah following .3 seconds behind to take second. Jared Graves piloted his enduro race bike to third place, 3.33 seconds back. Not all of the race favorites made it onto the podium, though, including Sam Hill, who had a ground-shaking crash, washing out towards the bottom of the course, and Steve Smith, who bobbled a corner high up on the track, squashing his chances of taking the win.
no 27.5 on the podium. 29 is way back , better luck next year!.
www.pinkbike.com/photo/10039725
I was very happy to see Jared on hot seat for so long!
This shows 26er is [still] the weapon of choice even with Enduro setup
Long live Greg Minnaar!!!
Awesome champs!
I mean I'm on this site almost everyday and I don't see many articles about wheel sizes... yeah it's a topic of discussion but it doesn't seem to be a big deal at all.
Didnt a 29er do well at sea otter too?
Congrats Greg and Rachel. Amazing! Congrats Johannes Fischbach for ending up 9th!
but let's leave this wheel size discussion behind, why not talk about the winners`? minaar had an absolute epic run today and deserves the win on home soil!
Steve Smith - 27.5": crash in the first corner.
Loic Bruni - 26": crash in the first corner.
That is all.
And the guy who claimed Stevie and Mitch crashed because of big wheel flex.....what about Hill?
My worry is that the after market stuff just isn't there in any quantity, rims,tyres, mud gaurds. Then look at the generally poor starting spec of a 29er, fork upgrades are very expensive, an a must for anything under 1k.
That for me makes it feel a bit rushed by the industry
Hopefully next year they will have a real dh-track again.
@deelight, The data that the industry conveniently forgets to proclaim in their rolling and momentum testing data is braking distance and gyroscopic forces. So speed is all blah, blah, blah until you have to turn and then accelerate.
@Bigbossman: frames do go bad. Aluminum has a fatigue life of less than 1 year under a pro, and 5 years for the average rider. After that, fatigue sets in and it becomes more prone to cracking.
Have you ever seen an enduro track?
You may win or loose on a 26 bike and you may win or loose on any other wheelsize. It's all about the track, the rider, luck and any othergiven circumstance. So it won'tchange anything anyways so we can aswell stick to riding 26''
29" pie chart anyone?
1. Being able to replicate results exactly over and over and over again is just impossible in our sport. The environment is anything but steril and is constantly changing. Not only is the track changing but the riders line choice differs on every run by a few inches here or there which is more than enough to make a difference in every single run. One wrong bump and you just lost a second in one section.
2. The results wouldn't matter because each rider is different. As is each of the three wheel sizes we're currently offered. I've ridden niners and 26" bikes quite a lot to be honest (650b not so much) On some trails I'm faster on a niner, on some I'm definitely not. You can have a chart that shows you overall results and the averages and whatnot, but that won't matter to you. What will matter is how you feel on the bike. How you ride, what you like. That's all that matters.
3. Bike geo and suspension design are also a big part. One niner may be more suited than another. One 26" bike may be more suited than another.
The bottom line is there are just too many variables.
I truly wish people would just get over this whole wheel size debate faster than they are. I've seen these same reactions over other aspects and changes to the sport for god knows how long. I'm 30 for christs sake, I've seen mostly all of it change and the rage people would get into over silly things.
This sport is still so damn young and there is still so much progress to be made that to cling to one idea, one type of wheel size, one type of bike, one type of drive train, one type of bar width, etc... is just asinine. Pardon my french, but it's f*cking stupid.
I rode a 2005 hardrock with wide ass bars and a short stem with a rock shox dart 2 for YEARS and rode faster than anyone I knew on it and did a damn sight better in many races (even some DH races) than people with full suspension rigs, or full blown DH sleds. Does that mean that a hardtail with 100mm of travel is the best bike? HELL NO. And I'm not stupid enough to think that and I would hope that the rest of you lot would be smart enough to realize that one type of bike is never going to be the answer for any discipline no matter the tantrums.
Just step back for a second and look at the entire sport, all disciplines, all the varying trail types, all the conditions, all the different sized riders, all the riding styles, EVERYTHING. Take it all in, absorb that. People throw tantrums and say "Oh it's a scam, it's marketing" etc... It's not. The industry, while more mature and advanced, is still in it's adolescent stages and is still figuring itself out. It's still growing up. And hopefully it'll never grow up and keep advancing.
Does anyone here actually think Ropelato or Stevie give a flying shit if you don't like their wheel sizes? No, they don't. Want to know why? They just like to ride bikes.
Bikes of all suspension designs, all wheel sizes, all stem lengths, all drive train arrangements, all disciplines. Somehow this community got lost and took on (more notably the 26" dedicated crowd) a view of "us vs them". That's just straight up bullshit. It's a bike. Bikes come in all shapes, sizes, and colors. Bikes are fun. All bikes are fun. And for some reason, most of the people here forgot that at some point in their life. I haven't forgotten that. I love bikes. I love riding bikes.
I think almost everyone here should take a page from the book of Matt Hunter. "If you enjoy mountain biking, you can see the fun in every single one of the different ways of doing it." One of the best ambassadors of our sport, one of the best riders our sports seen, and one of the nicest people in the world gets it. I think perhaps the rest of us should get on board with his ideology. Because if Matt Hunter is wrong, then f*ck it, I'm okay with being wrong too.
If we are talking dinnovation and development in wheels department, all that takes to make Average Joe ride faster with more confidence is making wider rims, like ZTR or Syntace does. And Syntace did a wuality research on that. This isn't happening, Mavic presents new Enduro wheels for 2014 with precambrian widths good to properly support a tyre up to 2.00. Other major players are increasing widths at snails pace. Why only Schwalbe experiments so much with tyre patterns and sidewalls? Why only Maxxis and Schwalbe provides tyres that are easy to seal as Tubeless Ready. There's a whole of a lot of sht to do with wheels alone, and they just redesigned everything, to gain nearly nothing.
So instead of actual improvements we are given blurry bullcrap. And now we have no choice either. So people are pissed off. Get it! They will be, because they have reasons for it.
I do like to try and get to winterberg for the dirt masters though. As go a place as any to meet fellow pbers.
Problem with the uk is the big cost of actually getting off the island. Once in proper Europe travel is a whole lot easier
Of course determining existence of a difference will not necessarily tell you the cause of that difference. Takes proper experiment design to factor out any systematic errors and effects.
The problem is, nobody is interested in doing that on a proper scale. They are only interested is selling bikes. Fair enough.
People are going on and on about Stevie Smith's crashing out and how 26ers dominated yet again, while ignoring all the big names who raced on 650Bs and 29ers other than Steve and Mitch Ropelato, not to mention what Greg Minaar himself uses for Enduro racing (Santa Cruz Bronson which is a 650B bike).
enduro-mtb.com/en/enduro-world-series-this-is-what-the-pros-race-on-today
Now look at the dh-bikes. There are a few gems. 62-63 static HA, proper axle sizes, strong wheels, great dampers, great forks and great and safe riding qualities. 26 won the championship because a great rider used unarguably great and well developed bike that has been on the market for 4 years. This happened on a track which was setup for 650 and 29 scoring a win. Which they incindentally did not because 29 and 650 plain suck - not enought travel, manouverability and acceleration. Put those cartwheel bikes on a real life dh-track and it is no contest at all.
What you are talking about is marketeering and n o t progress. One is defending marketshare, the other is making something obsolete because the next generation of bike is plain better than the previous one.
So no - I will not buy something that resets the huge fun I have doing what I like best: Going fast over real terrain, leaning into corners like crazy and run over tables like they dont exist, getting my heartbeat up and generally feel good for days after I did what I did.
Thing is, no one is actually making you buy a new bike.
The stuff for your 26" is going to be around for a very long time. But, and its a very bike but, when you go to buy your next full brand new bike there is a chance depending on who's bike you choose it may not be available in 26". That the time when you choose what to do.
@jit: My life is fine. What is not fine is the industry trying to push an arguably inferior design on everybody. It was a comitee decision of cretins - and that is/was never good for consumers. Lighten up.
@dee:GT only ever made inferior bikes. Look at the GT Fury - this thing sucks big time. Putting the BB and rear triangle together still is not working - after 20 years. Atherton win despite the bikes because they put a huge amount of dedication, training and talent into their career and a fair amount of Armstrongism. But then again Santa Cruz won with a four year old design and the field is practically devoid of riders riding GT.
Some people should start a MTB discipline called Lab-biking
On the plus side as humans we do adapt quite well and who knows we may find new advantages from slightly bigger wheels??? Stranger things have happened.
Let me give you an example: I just found an unused italian handmade columbus roadracing frame with complete Campy - down to the rims - from the early eighties. Guess what - that thing is way better than anything churned out today - including my top carbon roadracer. Its fast, extremely silent, comfortable and the gear change smooth instead of click, pling, crash.
Clipping the pedal might have caused the incident, but it looked to me like the neck brace caused the crash. Watch the video and notice how he is stuck on the front center of his bike and cannot get behind it, clearly because of the neck brace.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=y2KcU8zIg1Y&feature=youtube_gdata_player
And why does it seem that lately all the worst over-the-bars crashes are guys wearing toilet lids on their shoulders that keep then from riding low & safe?
Maybe you should try a toilet lid over your head. With a toilet attached.
I am so happy with Minnaar's win, he was one of my favorites but having know that he is in his hometown takes some of the feel out somewhere.
Peace!!
www.uci.ch/templates/UCI/UCI1/layout.asp?MenuId=MTI2OTc&LangId=1
If anything it means extra kudos to Sik Mik for being able to be only 0.3 seconds back to such a home turf advantage. Still, it was Minnaar's to lose and he certainly stepped up to the plate with a totally flawless and amazing run.
Mitch went over the bars and to the right after pushing the front. Steve had both wheels let go on him and couldn't arrest the slide.
I do agree however that the geo could make a huge difference in whether or not the rider can recover. In the case of the Specialized, it wasn't looking good. LOL
If the track was so easy why did so many pro's choke and crash in their race run?...
A true world champ will win on any track! a.k.a Minnaar, Vouilloz etc.
put these guys in a parking lot for a race and it would be entertaining.
Says Rob Warner. True enough...
1. 26ers dominates..
2. Minaar defends title with a Mandela helmet after a punture..
3. 29er crashed..
4. Sik Mik must be really sick being 2nd yet again at .03 of a sec...
5. Stevie looses it on the 1st turn, and finishes the course in style for the fun of it..
6. Sam Hill goes down... HARD...
and the list goes on the "DRAMA" in Pietermaritzberg!
Bigger wheels may or may not have their day in DH racing. Why people get on "team 26" or "team 29" is beyond me. I'm on "team holy-sh!t-that-guy-is-fast", and don't really care what size wheel they're on except for the intrigue of a few riders who make different choices.
This sport is awesome.
Amazing run by Minaar, the drop after "cloud 9" was something not from this world...
And also thumbs up for Jared Graves, showing just how efficient bikes are turning!
The old guard came good on his home turf, big congrats to Minnaar.
So gutted for Stevie and Canada, though I don't think it will be too long till the country that has brought so much to the world of biking has a World Cup/Champ!
No show for the GB men's team but big congrats to the Girls a clean sweep!
Also the forum nazis deleted my previous comment, but I don't care what anyone says, as tragic as it was, Ropelato's crash was poetic justice and quite comical cartwheeling on the first corner on a 29r enduro bike, so gutting to wipe out on the first corner!
Well, I am going to say it one more time. "26ers are here to stay"!!!
For Minnar: rules. (although wanted gee on top)
For Gee: gutted.
For Smith(and the company): choose the right gadget for the right place mate.
For Hill: legend.
Held on to the third place, bloody excellent!
Well done Greg, squashing twenty metre tables and making it look easy.
Hope Sam is OK :/
l like his helmet, respect to mandela
www.vitalmtb.com/photos/features/WINNING-BIKE-Steve-Smiths-Devinci-Wilson-Carbon,6196/WINNING-BIKE-Steve-Smiths-Devinci-Wilson-Carbon,61337/sspomer,2
Everyone was saying that the track would suit big wheels and that big wheels would be an advantage etc etc. Well the results prove that they arent a big advantage, in fact there is not really any difference at all. So why go to the expense of going 650 when you dont gain an advantage on a track that is supposed to suit them? I wouldnt say they are any worse, just not any better. so whats the point?
Or are you saying that if you aren't a top 10 rider then running big wheels will get you into top 10?
At the end of the day the 'special pmb 27.5 bike' got beat by 'normal' 26 dh rigs
FWIW, he was 2nd in the speed trap and the only other racer aside from Nick Beer (his team-mate) to break 50kpm there.
congrats to minaar..
Show the start.
Show none of 95% of the track.
Show the finish.
Sucks :'(
"Minnaar has won the UCI Downhill World Championship three times - in 2003, 2012 and 2013. He has finished second twice (2004 and 2006) and taken the bronze three times (2001, 2005 and 2010)."