Oh my god - What a weekend for UK mountainbike racing! An Atherton hatrick with 3 gold medals, a junior gold for Danny Hart and a Bronze for Fionn Griffiths. Proof that the UK really is the one to beat on the World MTB scene!
Saturday saw Dan Atherton destroy the 4X field with a stormer of a run. He missed the holeshot... but after about 10 pedal strokes took the lead and pinned it all the way to the finish - no contest. I don't think there's many guys out there who can out-sprint Lopes! Also, I don't think there were many riders doubling up the ENORMOUS F*in triple, let alone transferring it! Lopes, Tschugg and Pirmann were left to pick up the pieces...
There were some other great results for GB riders with Beaumont in 12th, Matt Simmonds in 22nd, Longden 23rd and Bernard Kerr 24th. Nice work to all of you! Check here for the full list of results.
Here's the men's 4X final:
The womens 4X saw ANOTHER UK podium with Fionn Griffiths taking 3rd place. Final here:
Sunday was the big one with everyone's eyes fixed pretty firmly on World Champs Sam Hill and Sabrina Jonnier.
The girls started pouring down the hill and eventually Florine Putin took the hotseat but was quickly kicked out by World Champ Sabrina Jonnier. Last girl on the hill Rach Atherton came storming out of the gate, attacking the top switch backs and pedalling hard into the open section. At the tight technical wooded section she was looking FAST as f*ck and like she might just pull of something very bloody exciting. She crossed the line with a 2.55.30, kicking Sabrina's ass by 8 SECONDS! Storming. Up in the commentary booth she was shooting the shit with Warner and joked "8 seconds aint bad, double figures would have been nice!". You can check out the ladies results here.
Here's Rach's winning run:
With Rach's win in the bag, the guys started storming down the hill. The weather was jumping between bright sun and heavy rain meaning lots of changes to the track and lots of head scratching about tyre choice. According to Gracia, spikes were the only option to get through the steep, loose wooded section.
First UK rider down was Matt Simmonds with a decent 2:48:50, with Stanny, Ben Cathro, Rowen Sorrell, Chris Hutchens and the rest of the boys steaming down. Stanny took an early seat in first place and held it for a LONG time before he was eventually knocked off the throne by Pascual Guardia and into 19th place. Danny Hart came down the hill and into junior first place, no doubt much to Milways delight who has been coaching him through Mxfitness... Helpfully the UCI monkeys were incharge of which runs were shown on the live feeds so his run never made it onto my screen... Sam Dale was looking pinned and up for a damn fine time until his front wheel washed out and he took a dive. Same story sadly for Donny and Brendan... Gutted.
Things really started to hot up as the rain started to fall and the fastest qualifying riders hammered out of the start gate. Minaar came down with a solid run and took the hot seat from Kovarik. He sat tight and held off the big guns like Peaty, Steve Smith and Barel... Greg must have been starting to sweat as second to last man down Sam "im gonna DESTROY you" Hill left the gate and pinned every turn, feet up and pedalling hard. He literally got 2 cranks in where everyone else could only get half a pedal in. At the final split, Sam was over a second up on Greg and crossed the line safely in first place. It's going to be a good season for Greg no question... but I don't think anyone doubted the Sam would kick his ass.
So... Gee had the lonely job of being last man in the start hut, with several World Cup winners and World Champs already down the mountain ahead of him. The track was churned up, loosed and wet. Of course also the added pressure of keeping up with Dan and Gee's wins. Whatever it was running through his mind it must have done some good. In the commentary booth Warner reckoned it as "poetry in motion". Gracia was screaming "Gooo one roast beeef!". He flowed the top switch backs, head up and firing out turns of the cranks everywhere he could. High line through the woods, floating over the tech rock section. 0.33 up at the final split.... And across the line to a screaming crowd, a screaming Rach, Dan and Dan Brown and a well deserved 1st place. Amazing to watch - even from hundreds of miles away on a tiny laptop screen. I can't WAIT for Fort Bill to catch this stuff up close!
Mens results here and Gee's winning run here:
MASSIVE well done to all the UK riders that got out there and put in a result. Also, of course to Stu and the boys at MTBCUT.TV.
