Pan Am Games, Day #1: Practice

Our trip to the Pan Am Games turned into a greater adventure than we ever imagined. We ended up spending more than 9 hours at the border crossing, and we lost the route a number of times because of bad signage.

On the road to Tafi

Finally, after spending 29 hours driving more than 1750 kms from Chile we arrived to Tafi del Valle, Argentina.

The name of this town comes from the word 'Taktillakta', and means "the town with a splendid entrance." Located at 2000 meters above sea level, it is a part of the Tucuman province. Tafi offers a magical contrast and diversity in its landscapes. The Pre-Colombian culture and archaeological ruins, the entry forest and the local cheese are the main tourism attractions.


Leslie+Omar (video) and Claudio (photo)


XC Course
The course is 5.4km long for one lap, and fulfills all UCI requirements. It's a nice and pretty intense course with high speeds, technical zones, complicated ascents and full speed downhills.

The Elite Men's race will be very challenging - the local Andres Catriel from Argentina, Favio Castañeda from Colombia, Pablo Montoya from Costa Rica, Rubeinho Valeriano and Enrique Avancini from Brazil and Javier Püschel and Cristobal Silva from Chile are the strongest riders that will have to ride 6 laps with a estimated time of approximately 1.5 hours.











DH Course
The course has two parts, beginning with an easy ride for 45 seconds, followed by a very tough and technical track with some rocks, destroyed turns and stepdowns. There are only two high speed jumps - we had expected more course work. It's very wide open and there are many lines to take by the riders who studied this on the previous day's walking inspection. Marcelo Gutierrez from Colombia, the local riders Santiago de Santiago and Jeremias Maio from Argentina, Antonio Leiva from Chile are the top riders from the continent. We don’t know why Aaron Gwin or Steve Smith don’t come visit us.

Tomorrow the competition begins with the XC Team Relays and the DH continues with practice. Keep checking back for more reports from this year's Pan Am Games. Thanks to Sebastian Vasquez (3 times World Master Champion) and Pato Farias (our travel partner and XC rider) for the details.

Photos by Claudio Olguin