Results - XC Vallnord World Cup 2018

 She's not yet done. Whew!

 I believe she podiumed last week as well.

 Damn son! I do remember her from her race in chateaudax at the 97 world championship lol. Time flies for everyone but Gunn Rita . She had a funky hair style with loads of piercings on her face. She was looking like some member of Prodigy haha.

I guess I'll feel kind of old all of a sudden when she retires. But for now the old school not done yet!

 @WAKIdesigns: wouldn’t take any credit away from one of the best xc racers of all time. Stupid comment on your behalf

 Asthma is a serious issue. Unfortunately athletes of some nations are affected more than others.

 @RedRedRe: british ones predominantly. But only ones that have won a Tour.....cheating f@@kers

 Why retire when you can still dominate? How many athletes in this kind of racing expect to win at 45yo? By the time she quits WC XCO, she's going to dominate XCM. Gunn-Rita, I hope you continue to inspire for a long time like that!

 @thestraightline: or he's just pointing out that she's still killing it despite having to deal with a pretty debilitating ailment. I understand though, it's Waki so let's all down vote him.

 @WAKIdesigns: how do you know? I know about this "issue" in Norwegian olympic team, but cannot find anything related to Gunn Rita.

 @vinay: That only shows me how bad the others must be. If a pro athlete can still dominant in a sport where endurance/strength and skill is the key and still werecking others who are in their prime something is really wrong.

 @Serpentras: People don't necessarily lose skill over time, not at her age, not someone who constantly utilizes those skills. Same with strength. Yes it may be hard to become stronger at that age but as she has been building strength for much of her carreer, she should still have enough left. As for endurance, I think it can actually improve at a later age whereas it may be tough for a younger athlete. What she may have lost would be some explosive power. So she may no longer kill it in a 4X or BMX race but instead as I mentioned, she may still have a long career of endurance racing ahead of her if that is what she want to do. That said, I wouldn't be surprised it the BMX/4X champs of yore would still hold their own if they'd rock up at one of these races.

 Super stoked for her!

 She was on fire in the last two rounds. Bummer for her mechanical, she was in the leading group but lost a good 20 sec with it. If she continues this form she can have her first WC win this season.

 I've never barracked for any individual woman in XC but Emily has made a fan of me in the last two rounds with her incredible will to fight. I will be cheering for her in MSA. Four winners of the womens XC in five rounds - what a great competition. I watch the womens races, but not the mens.

 @wasea04: Didn't watch it then? It's neither, it's actually 1:13 as it says on the results PDF .

 @wasea04: what are you raving about?? lol

 Eh, if you don't have the ability/desire to spend 2+ weeks at altitude it's best to not spend any time there and just come up for the event. In the course preview they said last year Nino only came up the morning of the race and still won- sounds like he did the same thing this year, just with a slightly different result.

 i am not sure that in the end it matters so much... we will see... GK was killing it race before last too... its good to see more of a pure climber in XC...

 GK did not go to any specific altitude camps. He just rode up the mountains around where he lives.
Nino lives in the same exact scenario as Gerry. The towns are at 600 meters, the mountains 5 minutes away. I am not sure where schurter rides, but I bet he could have easily gone over 2000 meters for his training rides.
I think 6 consecutive years at the very top are a lot for an endurance cyclist with his riding style. It is normal that his muscles start loosing explosiveness. He needs to learn how to ride differently if he wants to stay on top, because recovery is much slower now.
Moreover Red Bull and media in general created this super n1no figure that he (probably his team entourage more than him) feels the need to justify/find some excuses for his severe beating!

 @RedRedRe: It doesn't work like that. You have to either live or spend several continuous weeks at high altitude for your body to acclimate.

Moreover the opposite may be better, live in altitude, train in plain.

 @eFat @RedRedRe you need about 20 hours a day at altitude for your body to acclimate and produce more red blood cells so that you can process the oxygen optimally... if you use an altitude tent to simulate high altitude you can acclimate with about 16 hours per day... and it takes about 4 weeks of this to get the maximum benefit... but you can see some change in as little as 2 weeks...

the current thinking of altitude training is just to get the acclimation by sleeping and living at altitude, you dont need to train at high altitude, and most ppl recommend to live high, but to train at low altitude to get the best benefit of all...

if you cant get a full cycle (4 weeks) to acclimatize fully before an event the rule of thumb is "2 days or 2 weeks"... you either do 2 weeks to at least get *some* acclimation, or you you show up on the day basically and at least limit your losses due to the stress and fatigue that you will first experience before your body can begin to adapt...

 @eriksaun @eFat from what I understand he trained at altitude, including a marathon race at 3000 meters, but he did not do any altitude camps. It does increase your resistance. He raced almost every week in the past 2 months. Regardless, 1600 meters, Vallnord, it is not considered high altitude. You can breath pretty much the same as 0 meters. Go over 2000 meters and it becomes a problem. All of this has been bought up by nino schurter camp to justify his second place 1 minute behind.

 Kerschbaumer has won the rainbow jersey as Junior and U23. Won the U23 world cup winning all races but 2.
Not exactly an "underdog". He suffered the huge pressure and expectations to get results in the last year as U23 and as he turned elite.
Now that he moved to a smaller team with smaller goals, his head is clear again.

If anything, I have learned that is fishy when the same person wins all the time... history has plenty of examples.

 Injured. Suposed to be back for MSA.

 Nino just couldnt cope with the pace on the brutal steep and short climbs and not enough technical descent for him to catch anything back. Defo a climbers track.

 @betsie: can’t think any track this year with a more technical/ natural descent.

 @RedRedRe: if 2 berm descents and a grassy field are your thing.

 @betsie: go look at pictures of actual terrain.

 @betsie: Descents were technical and Nino could get back 10 seconds a couple of times but in the last three laps he didn’t have answer when the guy broke him on the climbs.

 @bikeinbih: so true- i was really surprised that Bart and Rob were not really explaining the tactic... GK made a good tempo that put NS on the edge, then pushed a bit over on the climbs to force NS to chase back... he had to push the descents and even sometimes on the flat sections too while GK could recover a bit... NS left a lot in the dirt until finally he had nothing... GK just stretched the elastic repeatedly until it broke... and Bart and Rob were just going on about how NS was so easy to come back on the descents... but each time he had to pay... and eventually ran out of money...

 @eriksaun: yeah, well explained. You must follow road cycling to get the tactics. When he figured he had more legs, he was playing like the cat and the mouse. And btw GK is quite a bike handler and a certified mountain men, like NS.

Rob and Bart tho, they have to make stories and characters for the public, thats their job.

 @RedRedRe: I did look at the terrain. I am I Andorra and saw the track. I shared the lift with the woman's world champion and her and her teammate were (winning team) were talking about the additional laps and changes made yesterday to the number of laps. It was dry and had been for a few days so the track was nicely worn into a mostly smoother line wasn't very technical in the end.

It rained last night hard so it's gonna be greasy for first practice for world masters today which I am here for.

It