Qualifying - Fort William DH World Cup 3
It takes a certain kind of person to stand in the start hut of the Fort William World Cup track at 6.30am, in a gale force wind and form a smile. Even if it's forced. There's some kind of prominent courage, ignorance or mental short-circuit that exists throughout this species we know as the professional downhiller, no doubt about it.
A freak early start was declared last night to ensure qualifying ran smoothly to it's end and without anyone going zorbing in a Nevis cable car. Today safety would come first... but it would be closely followed by the young Aussie racer Troy Brosnan, as he descended ahead of the mob for the very first time. Danny Hart and Sam Hill weren't far behind, leading a pack of perhaps 3 or 4 others who could realistically claim the Scottish throne. Brook Macdonald made a welcome return to top ten qualifying as well as the long awaited Steve Smith who stole into 7th, only 5 seconds back after his two round hiatus. Atherton is far too quiet back in 6th and Minnaar came in 12th on the rim. The danger men are massing. Meanwhile, Luca Shaw made his impression on the juniors and Manon blew up the women's with a deadly 10 second blast radius.
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 In the summer this far North you only get 4 or 5 hours peace before the birds get going. The sun rises here in Fort William sometime around 3:30 am and it's a slow sunrise that casts it's warm golden light for hours... Perfect, you could say, for shooting a very early morning practice session. |
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| Steve Smith and Mark Wallace getting their warm up in the fresh morning air in order to commence the full plethora of qualifications before the high winds could wreak their havoc. |
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| Wallace drops in as the sun just starts to breach. |
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| A rampaging Blenky, currently 3rd in the series, storms out of the gate and fights the mounting wind. |
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| #morningcommute. Sam Hill goes to work first thing this morning. Looking faster every day here, he qualified third with 3rd and 2nd fastest splits. Of course everyone outside the tape is itching to see if he can go all the way tomorrow. |
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| It takes a lot to rock a fully loaded cabin, but people riding to the top were getting to know the pylons pretty well. |
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| Other than the crazy wind levels up top, today was an absolutely beautiful day in the highlands. God bless dry Scotland. |
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| Mitch Ropelato cuts a turn on a bed of marbles at about 60kph. Carnage never looks far away up on the moor. |
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| Damien Spagnolo getting loose in the ever-so-rowdy turns of the 'Bill. |
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| Side-show Bobs. |
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| Luca Shaw pinned with a slew of juniors biting at his ankles. He'll do well here, but will need to keep on his game to keep up top and hopefully get that number 1 plate back. |
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| With a win in South Africa and a disappointing result in Cairns, Shaw is right back where he wants to be. |
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| Martin Maes is at his first DH race and he has qualified second. He was first at the second split. Now you are all going to ask- "what the hell is he doing racing enduro?" He's kicking ass. |
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| Loris Vergier fully pinned and looking the fastest through this section in practice. With a small mistake today, he will be putting the pressure on Luca tomorrow. |
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| Neil Stewart following his dream to a fourth qualie in the juniors. |
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| Matt Simmonds had a solid qualifying run today coming in at eighth. |
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| Ratboy, Neethling and Sam Dale were all in the back today due to crashes or other issues. Unfortunately for Needles he wasn't a protected rider and won't be riding tomorrow. |
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| Loic Bruni scrubbing over some slippery rocks. Rain is falling this evening and will continue to do so tomorrow making the track tack up significantly. A rash of showers tomorrow will make for a good day of racing and hopefully it won't be too soggy. |
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| Bruni getting taped up for a slight shoulder injury by Martin the masseur. Few people know how often and how hard these racers crash when they are pushing the limits in practice. Playing through the pain is part of the program. |
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| Blenki among the other lightweights up top in the ranks today. He lost some time high on the track with a mistake, but had made it up by the second split to get himself into 4th position. |
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| The table/wall ride was an interesting place to be during qualifying, providing a great sense of who was carrying speed best on towards the hoofer and below. Blenky made sure style and pace were delivered on time with one of his classic ET-whips. |
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| Bernardo Cruz threading the needle through rocks and slippery gravel. |
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| Joe Smith on the hunt for Scottish plunder. |
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| Long time flat pedal rider, Connor Fearon, finally caved in and was clipped in on track today to heal with the massive impacts and high speeds. |
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| Didn't we call it yesterday, that Manon Carpenter looked like the woman to beat this weekend. With a win in the qualifying round she has set the bar for everyone else today. |
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| My, what big eyes you have, Rachel... |
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| Yes we were surprised too. Today just wasn't Rachel Atherton's day. It's not often you can say that. |
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| Always smooth and stylish, Myriam Nicole excels here and came 2nd today.Closing the 10 second gap to 1st will be a big push, however. |
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| Because of lift safety in the gale force conditions, all riders had to be up the top by 10:30 to await their qualifiers on mass. Troy looks for a bike parking space and spot to shelter before his warm up. |
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| Jill Kintner going into the zone on her trainer. |
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| Finding a quiet place to warm up can be trying even when the wind's not howling; Aaron Gwin found a man-cave as far from the distractions as he could to get his game on. |
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| Don't make him angry, you wouldn't like him when he's angry... Dark clouds brew overhead as Gee qualifies outside of a podium place. Of course it would be pure madness to rule the Gee-man out of one tomorrow. |
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| Sam Hill hasn't won here since his Word Champs victory in 2007. Seven years later he will be looking for that little bit of extra pace after qualifying 3rd. |
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| Although the wind was severe up high, most of the day the bad weather never actually materialized and everyone got up early for no reason. God damn.. |
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| Sam Dale charging hard through the last of the open slopes before a blowout at lower altitude. |
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| Beaumont stormed the BDS at Ae and is looking frisky and sharp all the way down the grey mile that is Fort Bill. He podiumed here too last month so despite a weak 18th qualie, anything is possibly for Slugger tomorrow. |
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| Ever started a race and wished your bike was just a little lighter? Mission accomplished for Slovenian national champ, Zarjia Cernilogar. |
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| As always, it's a party here in Scotland. |
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| All hail Fort William in all it's glory. |
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| Steve Smith - back and ready to attack. See that plate ? Number 81 and almost looks like a 1 which it could easily be the truth only a few races down the line. Seventh today in qualies. |
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| We have been anxiously awaiting him back on track and find out how he's going. Now we just have to wait and see if he can put up a result here like last year's. |
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| After Stevie's late run down, the planes came out and most of the crowd quit watching the qualifications and turned their heads towards some dual fighter plane action. It was pretty distracting to be fair. |
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| Unknown... like a bit of a boss. |
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| Aaron Gwin snakes his way down the last bit of open slope before heading into the muddy woods. |
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| This race won't be black and white for Gwin after his 5th qualifier, but rest assured he is pushing some speeds that take your breath away at the side of track. He has found a new gear this season, so we have to assume a bunch of the other top contenders have too. |
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| Fastest in timed training yesterday, and second in qualifying, Danny Hart is unmistakably hard on the gas this weekend. |
 | You always tend to go that bit faster for your race run and today I made some really small mistakes, but all those add up into time that can be made. We'll see how it's looking in the morning and then shred in the afternoon! It's just between me and track that's all it is. There's ten people that could win the race so that's not for me to worry about, just do what I do and hopefully do it well. I've had a bit of bad luck this season with illness and a stupid crash in Australia with those conditions and it all just didn't go my way so I'm glad to be back in Europe now on proper tracks with a proper set up. Just ready to lay the law down now you know hopefully- Danny Hart - GIANT FACTORY OFF-ROAD TEAM |
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| Danny Hart gripped and showing he means business, desperate to finally get it together here. |
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| Dave Garland, a normal-sized man working on a Giant bicycle. Danny's mechanic keeps us informed... |
| We made some serious changes to the bike at the BDS, ride height and compression changes and did everything we could to ensure the bike was going to role very quick because we knew the track was going to be smoother come the world cup. All those things came into play today, but we still have to do it again tomorrow! It was a 5.30 start this morning, which is fairly unusual so we had to get everything nailed down yesterday and it was all very weird, no one around, no spectators. I think there's been one schedule to a World Cup like that I can remember since I started, which was '96 and that was Maribor in 2009 because of an electrical storm. So a strange day!- Dave Garland - GIANT FACTORY OFF-ROAD TEAM |
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| Rob Parkin called it before the quali even started. Remind me to have him chat up my bookie for the final. |
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| Getting twisted through the first woods section, today he put it all together to qualify on top for the very first time in his career. |
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| Troy's clearly in his best form yet, and he's obviously put winter training to good use with his sprint skills. In Cairns and on the motorway section here we have seen some pedal power that looks pretty much unmatched. |
| I've been doing a lot of work in the off-season, trying hard to get to that next level and I trusted myself today and made it happen. Definitely it was an advantage coming here 3 weeks ago to do the British round- got some good practice done and got all the major settings dialed in. We've been feeling good, almost a step ahead of everyone else so I'm excited, just gotta do the same thing tomorrow!- Troy Brosnan- SPECIALIZED RACING DH |
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| More than a little happy to see his name up at the top of the list for today and at the bottom for tomorrow. |
| I've never been last man down the hill before at the World Cup, but I dunno it's just a race run I've probably got another hundred thousand races to go. I'll go out, cruise along, have fun and hopefully yeah get the win- Troy Brosnan- SPECIALIZED RACING DH |
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| Team Spesh taking a detailed look back at their runs from the day, supported by still photos team manager Eric Carter makes from the side of the track. |
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| It's been a long day here in Fort Bill, riders and mechanics were up top by 7:00 am. TWR mechanic Ben Arnott treats himself to a frosty reward for a job well dome. |
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| Red Bull fighter planes spiraling into the skies high above the Nevis Range. Anybody ready for tomorrow's dogfight? |
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