Practice Photo Epic: EWS Finale Ligure 2021
The Enduro World Series continues this week in one of its most iconic of venues this week in Finale Ligure, Italy for the penultimate round of 2021
First up for racers is the Pro Stage on Saturday, followed by four more stages on Sunday. In the men’s race, Richie Rude leads the series, but the title is far from a foregone conclusion, with Jack Moir still within touching distance in the points. Despite the shoulder injury he sustained in Crans-Montana last week, Moir still managed to salvage enough points to keep his championship hopes alive and proof that the season-long battle between him and Rude shows no signs of letting up. Danger could also come in the form of Jesse Melamed, who took the win last time the series raced Finale in 2020 and was just six seconds shy of a win at the last round.
Melanie Pugin will be on the hunt to extend her already sizable points lead in the overall and will be more than motivated by her win in Crans-Montana last week. However, 2020 Finale winner Morgane Charre would like things to go a different route as she’s yet to win a round this year despite standing on four of the season's seven podiums. Chasing her down will be Harriet Harnden who is tied on points with Charre in the series championship, with the stakes being raised even higher by Isabeau Courdurier who is just five points back in fourth.
It's hot, dry, fast and rough here in Finale, and we are in for one heck of a weekend.
All kinds of bikes are hanging about in Finale this week.
No rain has fallen here in months
It's the driest we have ever seen in Finale
Twisty ancient streets in a very old part of the world
Unique liaisons take riders through the old villages scattered throughout the hillside
Stage 1 starts out fast and relatively smooth, but only for a short time
Quite different to the alpine slopes raced the past two weeks
Mitch Ropelato made the trip over for his first EWS of the season
You know it is a bit janky when you lose a shoe tipping over in a switchback
Zakarias Johanson on Stage 5
Sam Hill might not be having a great season, but he still makes the hardest sections of the trail looks simple
Richie Rude will be pushing to the max this week in hopes of expecting his series lead with just one more round to go
Ella Connolly on Stage 4
Harriet Harnden through the rock garden on Stage 3
Melanie Pugin is the favorite for the women
Damien Oton into the woods below the old NATO base
Morgane Charre is 2nd in points and looking for her first win of the season
Dimitri Tordo always looking fast
Katy Winton on Stage 1
Martin Maes has turned up the speed at the end of the season and will be a threat here
Jack Moir has his shoulder strapped up and isn't going to let the championship escape without a fight
Jesse Melamed has won here last year and has been looking fast and confident
Usually it's green in the hills here, but months without rain has left it dry and brown
McKay Vezina on Stage 3
Trench warfare Finale Ligure style
Andreane Lanthier Nadeau is giving it a go this week after being forced to sit out the last two rounds with injury
Matt Stuttard at the top of Stage 3
Antoine Vidal on Stage 4
Noga Korem on the very technical Pro Stage
Robin Wallner racing for the final time in Finale
Kasper Woolley chasing the elusive first podium after being close the past two rounds
Matt Walker has been on a bit of a hot streak and hopes to carry that into this week in Finale
Isabeau Courdurier will be chasing after the overall podium this week
Raphaela Richter on Stage 2
Lots of sun on the horizon this week for racers in Finale Ligure
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Maybe, just maybe, in one case or the other, it might be worth to decide if you want to produce art or document a sporting event - both very rarely work well together in the same shot, in my experience.
None of these shots transports any sense of speed, I don’t need motion blur by default, but those are just dead.
Some are overexposed, others too dark, the focus is sometimes not on the rider, which in some cases is even partly hidden by objects in the foreground… all on purpose, I’m sure, still not good craftsmenship unless we’re talking artistic value, which is simply not what I expect in sports photography. And these shots are too boring to qualify as art.
And I’m only doing architecture photography these days, stuff that by default doesn’t move, so I would probably be way out of my depth.
But do you necessarily have to be Paul Bocuse to tell someone their recipe contains too much salt?