Sunday of the HSBC UK National Downhill Series presented by GT Bicycles began with much more promise than its predecessor. Racers awoke to blue skies and scattered cloud; as the day progressed the cloud dispersed making way for the elusive Welsh sunshine. Despite the drier climate the track remained saturated, throughout the day it did dry out to some degree. If anything this only made an already technical track more challenging, the roots were exposed and polished from the high volumes of traffic. The once fine wet slop gradually reduced to slick grease, a common affair for UK racing!
Sections of the track were beginning to suffer wear and tear. Most notably a deep unsupported rut forming between the start and marshal point 1. This was a single line affair and the riders fresh out of the gate were hitting the section exceptionally hard. This resulted in many riders getting hung up, including World Champion, Danny Hart and world cup rival, Gee Atherton. After a discussion between the maintenance teams, organisers, and riders the decision was made to run the course. The alternatives were a long closure for maintenance or alteration of the taping immediately before race runs. As changes cannot be made to the track without riders being offered practice runs the decision was made to run the track in its current status with removal of some loose logs and rock. There was also a delay to the start after a juvenile rider damaged some essential netting over a river crossing near the bottom of the course.
Danny and Gee both had to retrace their steps after getting hung up in the rut
Rainbow stripes throughout.
Round
#2 of the UK National Downhill Series takes us to Fort William, Scotland on May 13th and 14th 2017. It's sure to be a big line-up, as the riders squeeze in the runs leading up to the 2017 Fort William World Cup shortly after!
Full Results
here.
MENTIONS: @GTBicycles /
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@tris400d
Rachel Atherton - Most successful female downhiller ever - 2.28
Top 3 15-16 year old boys - 2.23, 2.26, 2.27......
How is this possible???
Is it cultural or psychological or something like that?
If you looked at another sport would you see a similar pattern or is downhill behind when it comes to encouraging girls into the sport?
Also, Rachel Atherton opening up a 10s gap to Manon Carpenter? HOW?
All this means a higher V02 max which is important when it comes to sports like downhill where it's a whole-body exercise performed at a near maximum intensity for a somewhat long duration.
I bet those kids on a WC track would be slower than Rach.
If it was a 2 minute race on road bikes then this would be simple.
But maybe that little bit extra gets gee up to a higher speed out of the gate, maybe it means he hits a transition perfectly and loses no speed, maybe he can make 3 consecutive bunny hops 4 minutes into a World Cup run where Rachel can only do two...