This is the weather everyone woke up to this morning. Blue sky, then pouring rain, then clearing skies. By the time most of the top 20 headed up for a run, it was hot, humid and sunny again. In the Alps, if you don't like the weather, you can wait 10 minutes.
The start of the Men's XC0 World Cup Final, Nino Schurter went on to take the win.
The XCO Finals were in town this weekend. Literally! Marco Aurelio Fontana and Nino Schurter fight it out.
Burry Stander & Jeroslav Kulhavy race through a wooden berm in town.
Gunn-Rita won here and also won in La Bresse, so this makes it 2 for 3 on French soil in 2012. XC marathon worlds will also be held in France.
Jared Graves is affectionately known as Grubby to his friends and teammates. This morning Fox gave him and teammate Richie Rude new forks...
The Fox techs were just a little bit nervous when they first gave Richie his new fork.
It rained during the night and in the morning, but when practice started the sun came out and the course started to dry pretty quick. Marc Beaumont testing it out.
Remi Therion wasn't afraid to get down in the dirt and put his mud tires to work this morning.
Man Child in the mini rock segment.
Aaron Gwin has 5 stitches in his hand and was taking it easy on course this morning.
Sam Hill was just outside the top ten at the splits during the qualifying round on Friday, but then flatted towards the finish. This course should suit his riding style, he can do well here tomorrow.
Cameron Cole qualified first here, is this his weekend?
Bryn Atkinson is by himself this weekend, Jill Kintner is at home with a broken arm she picked up at Windham.
Sabrina isn't the only one to retire this year, Justin Leov also announced his retirement from World cup racing at the end of this season.
This track is hard on everything: riders, bikes, mechanics. The suspension techs have been kept busy rebuilding forks and tuning suspension on this especially rough track.
Loic Bruni qualified 8th yesterday, everything is clean and ready for tomorrow!
The off camber section into the final wooden drop was especially slick this morning. It was a struggle to stay in your line if you didn't commit fully.
Ben Reid didn't have any commitment issues, he pinned it straight in and held speed.
This time he's actually carrying an injury from it? Not that an injury ever stopped a terminator.. haha I'm just excited to see how the race will unfold!
i met a young guy in new jersey at my freind larzes house a bunch of years back he was hitting a huge prob 30 plus maybe forty foot double larz had at his house that you had to charge at and as the day went by people were amazed by this guys power and mad skill come to find out the guy was a 14 year old kid that we started calling man child because of his sheer power and size .. 4 years or so later its funny to see how nick names start sorry richie...lol
Yeah i want to know as well. He just needs that extra little bit more and he can get a WC win. It will be a shame to see him go without one, If he cant pull one off this season.
He has been doing WC for a good ten years and could just be ready to slow down a bit. (Being newly married may have an impact). More importantly how will replace him @ TWR? Mr Martin Whiteley should immediately sign Matt Scoles, plain an simple. Not because he's another kiwi but because he's damn fast and consistent. Current Oceania champ and not to mention 16th overall in WC for 2011 with several top ten results in some events (and that was just with an Italian national team, imagine what he could do with full factory support!!)
Yeah, it will be sad to see him go without a win or podium (has he had a podium? top 3?). I hope he totally beasts it in one of the next rounds or, even better, at Worlds and takes the win, that'd be a dam sik way to go out!
flag BeerGuzlinFool (0 mins ago) This course does not look worthy of a world cup.. It just looks thrown together. I agree with you. After being at WINDHAM, and seeing what hell of a course they prepared there, this is just a goat track adapted to the race, with technical section in between. Yes it is challenging, but not what I like to see. My own two cents
It's mostly natural and goat paths besides the building drops and stuff and little hits. You obviously don't realize that the terrain changes where ever you go In the world. So it's not thrown together at all. Please think about
something before saying it next time.
We all know that terrain changes from course to course but some of the sections literally look like a couple of guys grabbed some hoes and cut in a path a couple of days before the riders arrived.ijust think that world cup racers deserve better.
@BikerDude000 Why would they build a track in a place where they can't even have media and spectators down most of the track? As Greg Minnaar said (although I do hate his constant complaining) the area is surrounded with beautiful mountains and they had the terrain to build the perfect downhill track, but instead they chose to build it down some crappy goat track using buildings as obstacles?? makes no sense. Please get some information on the subject before saying something next time.
Don't be dumb. You can see the start track from the bottom of the friggen MOUNTAIN (thats what its on if you since you weren't pay attention) it doesn't get much better for spectators or media than that not to mention that this track does not suit minnaars riding style. The off camber sections On loose rock is incredibly hard to negotiate in dry and even more so in wet, the track is basically loose roughy rock all the way down, those goat trails would make you second guess walking down them. It's a steep gnarly track that will really test a riders ability to control their bikes. Thank you for being a complete idiot. get you facts straight before you come back with weak bullshit like that.
um sorry i'm a bit late, but didnt you hear that they wernt allowing spectators to watch from the sidelines down most of the track? thats what i meant. and also sure it was technically hard track but as i have already said quoting Minnaar that the surrounding mountains were amazing and they could have built an even more amazing track that could actually allow spectators
You're not serious are you? This is soooo worthy of a world cup. This is easily one of the most challenging courses they've had to ride in a long while. It's so raw and natural and rugged, this is about as pure DH as you can get. I much prefer this to some of the more "buffed" tracks we've gotten. This track is a monster.
you can tell its one of the most challenging tracks based on the stuff that happened in qualis and practice, that wouldnt happen if the track was a piece of cake
edit: like the others were any safer
I'm just excited to see how the race will unfold!
Hill
Gee
Bruni
Mucky Nutz
More importantly how will replace him @ TWR? Mr Martin Whiteley should immediately sign Matt Scoles, plain an simple. Not because he's another kiwi but because he's damn fast and consistent. Current Oceania champ and not to mention 16th overall in WC for 2011 with several top ten results in some events (and that was just with an Italian national team, imagine what he could do with full factory support!!)
This course does not look worthy of a world cup.. It just looks thrown together.
I agree with you.
After being at WINDHAM, and seeing what hell of a course they prepared there, this is just a goat track adapted to the race, with technical section in between. Yes it is challenging, but not what I like to see. My own two cents
Why would they build a track in a place where they can't even have media and spectators down most of the track? As Greg Minnaar said (although I do hate his constant complaining) the area is surrounded with beautiful mountains and they had the terrain to build the perfect downhill track, but instead they chose to build it down some crappy goat track using buildings as obstacles?? makes no sense. Please get some information on the subject before saying something next time.
Gwin (even w/ a F'd up hand)
Hill
Gee
Cole
Bryceland