Finals Photo Epic: Brawling in the Dust - Les Gets World Cup XC 2019
Photo Epic presented by Topeak
After a game of cat and mouse, Nino Schurter takes the win for the men in Les Gets while Kate Courtney walked away with the win for the women. The dust was high, and the pace was fast with the elite women racing 7 laps and the men 8 on the climbing course. Kate Courtney came back from a rough weekend in Andorra guns blazing first taking the win in short track, then getting out in front and putting thirty-three seconds into second place finisher Jolanda Neff. Neff had a rough start and fought her way from somewhere around eighth place to finish second. Elisabeth Brandau from Germany took third after a strong performance in the short track Friday. For the men, the assumption was that the course suited Mathieu Van Der Poel, but MVDP was lagging and would find himself mid-pack before moving up with some blistering lap times. MVDP finished sixteenth. Gerhard Kerschbaumer took second after taking the lead for a stint, with Nino letting him do the work before making his move. Henrique Avancini continued to show amazing form and rode to third place. Now at midseason, we take a short break and move on to Val di Sole in two weeks.
Evie Richards warms the legs up in the cool morning air.
Ronja Eibl ready for the start. The course in Les Gets seemed perfectly suited for her.
Evie Richards out in front in the early laps.
Laura Stigger rode to third today in the U23 women's race.
Ronja Eibl takes another win in the U23 women's race.
Kate Courtney took a moment of quiet before going out and stomping on the competition.
The dust was flying as the women took off.
Elisabeth Brandau has had a stellar weekend. Third place for the German.
Jolanda Neff had a shaky start but moved her way up to finish second.
Kate Courtney is back on top. She got out front and left the rest in the dust.
Kate Courtney broke away from the pack and stayed there for the rest of the race.
Sina Frei has had no problems making the transition from U23 to Elite. Frei took fourth today.
Pauline Ferrand Prevot landed a fifth place on home soil.
Kate Courtney takes another commanding win.
Jenny Rissveds started the race strong and even led but would cross the line in 9th.
Prevot and Frei on one of the many climbs. Frei would have Prevot in the end.
Women's podium- Kate Courtney, Jolanda Neff, Elisabeth Brandau, Sina Frei, and Pauline Ferrand Prevot.
Kate Courtney is certainly top of the field in 2019.
Sean Fincham has been on one hell of a ride this season so far and today was no different for the young Canadian.
Vlad Dascalu ready to dive in. There was a brief point midway through the race where we thought he cracked. He surprised many with a late comeback attack.
Filippo Colombo is a usual suspect for the U23 Men. Today. however, he'll be just off the podium.
Today was good for Maximilan Brandl. He had some battles up front that kept him busy, landing him a second place.
Fincham led the race for a number of laps early on.
Vlad the destroyer.
Vlad was surrounded immediately by his team. Huge effort from all.
Men's start was chaos in the dust.
Nino Schurter definitely has the endurance for this course but as we have seen so far this season, so do a few others on the front line.
Gerhard Kerschbaumer dialing in for the battle.
Kerschbaumer had a few battles today on course. He fended off a few successfully but the biggest one, Nino, burnt him out in the end.
Henrique Avancini lead the pack for the first little while of the race. He got caught then fought right back on the last lap for third.
Classic Nino whip on lap three.
Not Mathieu van der Poel's day here in Les Gets.
Kerschbaumer up front with Nino hot on his tail after passing Avancini.
Ondrej Cink was up front for a moment. He stayed on pace to close out the podium.
Big win for Nino. It was just a matter of time before he attacked. Well done.
Schurter pulling away from Kerschbaumer on the final lap.
The sprint for fourth came down to about a tire.
Nothing but respect between the men at the top.
Mathieu Van Der Poel couldn't find the legs that pedaled him to an XCC win the other night.
Men's Elite podium.
Author Info:
Must Read This Week
What happened to Rissveds could happen to Kate Courtney or anyone else. The pressure to be social media stars in addition to elite athletes is immense. I would guess contracts in our little sport are heavily incentive-based, creating the perfect environment for individual over-achievers to take training, diet and other aspects of preparation to an extreme.
It's as good a time as any to open up a dialogue about mental health in the sport. Let's see if any journalists are willing.
To be clear, this should not diminish Jenny's experience in any way. Depression is ruthlessly painful. It's incredible to see her start to come back from such a dark place, and it's great to see her sharing her story. I can't help but worry that there are others out there silently suffering. The sooner we learn that major depression is normal (and start talking about it normally) the sooner we can effectively help people with it.
I actually thought Nino and Kate's average speeds were 21 mph and 17.5 mph, instead of 21kph and 17.5kph! 13 and 10.8 mph seem a lot more realistic than the road race speeds I had thought were possible!
Would assume the tyres are his staple pro-only 170tpi 29x2.25" Aspens
All of the photos I can remember from this year have been the XMC, which he did use at Les Gets.
I need to do some more looking but I think he's only using the wider XMC this year.
Scroll down to Live timing and results, click on Results for Lets Gets and then either Men or Women and you got the individual standings on a pdf.
Rissveds was ranked 85th coming into Les Gets in UCI World Rank and was 32nd in World Cup Points. The UCI World Rank hasn't updated from today's results yet, so I'm not sure her new rank.
If she qualifies, she will almost certainly start in the first two rows for Sunday's race, giving her a much better chance at the podium without getting bogged down with 50+ riders starting ahead of her.
I think we have to think of this as a long-term reboot given her points situation, but I am surprised that her conditioning is as strong as it is given her long absence from World Cup racing. The future looks bright indeed.
At the last two races start position wasn't actually that important. In some ways starting at back forced a bit of pacing first lap which does help deeper into the race. This was particularly evident at Andora.
But yes, she's known to pack quite a few extra supplies during her WCXC races.
(It's a mini-shock tucked up into the top tube ala Commencal to create a soft-tail.)