Over 150 riders hit Ourimbah State forest over the weekend for the N.S.W State Champs, Central Coast Ourimbah MTB Club had the 2.5km track in good condition and with Mother Nature playing along, the conditions came together for a good weekend of racing! The track had a large pedal in the middle but plenty of cool corners and jumps made up for it. There were a lot of riders out on new bikes and with new teams, a kind of preview for the upcoming National/Vic Series! Continue reading “New South Wales – State Championships – Ourimbah”→
Congratulations to Steve Marsh who took out the Elite Men’s overall in the South Australian downhill series!
We love downhill 24 hours a day 7 days a week here at downhill247.com!A�We are happy to say we have been involved with the Trak Cycles race team this year, furthermore, one of the team riders, Steve Marsh, has taken out the South Australian state series in Elite Men! Congratulations Steve, this was Steve’s first full year back racing after not being able to race the past few series. The State Championships are still to come but look out for the team there and at other events across the country!
Connor Fearon was having fun on some of the big jumps in Norway, the added style was a bonus for everyone watching!
We finish our wrap up of the 2012 World Cup series with Connor Fearon’s Inside Info from Hafjell, Norway. This is what he had to say;
Norway was the final round for the season and I was hoping to finish it off on a high note. The team got to Hafjell a few days prior to the race. Turns out there nothing to do there when ita��s freezing cold and raining. Despite being labelled a�?Europea��s #1 bike parka�? it turned out to be below average and we couldna��t ride the race track until official practice. The exchange rate there is through the roof as well it felt like I spent more coin in the last week in Norway than the other 4 months of the tripa��
So the start of the week wasna��t all that exciting I was hoping I would cheer up after walking the race track on day 1. The track has a few different sections. Some jumps and corners in the open sections I really liked. Once the track weaved into the wooded sections it became my nemesis, it got pretty slow, technical and awkward. Definitely far from my preferred type of course.
Connor hitting the main rock garden (or jungle as it was being referred to!) on the course, not sure if that is optimum foot/pedal position this time round!
During practice I tried my hardest to pick lines that would open up the track a little bit even if it meant going over rocks and taking wider corners. The coolest obstacle on the track was the massive natural gap halfway down the track. I dona��t think the course builders meant for this to be jumped but it happened anyway. I hit the gap in practice and race run for the fans even though I cased it every time and might have been slower it was still the most fun I had on the track!
My race run was pretty solid until the last sections of the track where the wind picked up a lot and it felt like I was going backwards. I got blown badly by the wind on the last jump and almost crashed, doing this I stomped the ground pretty hard with my leg and hurt my knee which stopped me from pedalling to the finish. I got 38th position in the end which was disappointing because I moved back in the overall (Although beating Peaty still who had a problem in his run).
So my first full world cup series is done and dusted and Ia��m just about ready to head home now! Ia��ve learnt a lot in this season that will help me improve myself for the next world cup season. For now ita��s time to go back to Australia just in time for summer, have a good off season and come out swinging next year!
So Connor’s last race of the season might not have quite gone to plan but he still finished up 34th in the overall, combined with his 3rd place at World Championships, that’s a very impressive season! What will happen next year, downhill247.com will keep you in the loop!
Race 4 of the NSW/ACT State Series went off over the weekend at Mount Stromlo, this was of course home to the 2009 World Championships. A stacked field including juniors who have recently returned from the World Championships made up the field.A�Check out this exclusive edit from Ty Bowmaker (www.facebook.com/captyvatemedia) of the weekend.
Wild times here in Norway, as Thibaut Ruffian proves, drifting his way around one of the grassy turns on the track!
The race here inA�Norway ran to a different scheduleA�compared to the six previous World Cups.A�With it being it the last race of the season apparently the decision was made to hold the finals on Saturday allowing spectators to party on Saturday. The flip side of this is that crowd numbers were possibly a little less as the locals had to work on Friday!
Elite Men:
1. Steve Smith 3.31.76
2. George Brannigan 3.32.16 + 0.40
3. Greg Minnaar 3.33.90A�+ 2.13
4. Gee Atherton 3.34.05 + 2.29
5. Nick Beer 3.34.90 + 3.13
…
7. Sam Hill 3.36.51 + 4.75
11. Mic Hannah 3.37.41 + 5.64
20. Bryn Atkinson 3.39.06 + 7.30
38. Connor Fearon 3.43.12 + 11.36
47. Mitch Delfs 3.46.50 + 14.73
55. Josh Button 3.48.25 + 16.49
We were walking up the track as Bryn Atkinson went drifting past, two feet up, nice!Look at the concentration, unfortunately for Steve Peat a crash in his race run pushed him down to 71st.Mechanics are often little known and just go about their business but without them riders would be left high and dry!Just like mechanics, the media are generally little known but just get on with their job. Here photo guru Jacob Gibbins gets a lift to the start of the track.Some took their filming/photography a bit more serious than others!A lot of cameras were focused on this gap but only a few riders would send it.Emeline Ragot finished 2nd just over 2 seconds behind Rachel Atherton.Mic Hannah just missed out on a top 10 finish in 11th place.Australia’s highest placed finisher was Sam Hill in 7th.Greg Minnaar can never be ruled out, 3rd in the race and 2nd in the overall.Second place was George Brannigan, the young Kiwis best result thus far.Stevie Smith was all smiles for the cameras! 1st place…
Next to wrap up the race and the series for 2012 we will bring you Connor Fearon’s Inside Info from the race, stay tuned.
Today was the first day of practice here at Hafjell and it was a long day with an open practice session in the morning before the top 80 men/top 20 women had their own practice session. It was a fun day on the course though, the general consensus from the riders is that the track is a whole lot of fun and a good race track to boot!
The jumps at the top of the course saw the riders having some fun throwing down some big whips, this meant a fun day for everyone else watching!
Lets take a run through today’s proceedings;
It was a tentative start to the day with no one quite knowing what the cloud and fog had in store as everyone got on the gondola to head up to the top of the track…Fortunately as the gondola went up it broke through to the sunshine and the weather stayed dry all day. On another note, check out the roofs of the local houses here in Norway, got green?There was no shortage of riders serving up the style up the top of the track as Connor Fearon demonstrates!Some riders were slightly more business orientated, such as Mark Beaumont and were keeping it race through the jumps. We could literally have a whole gallery of action from these jumps. There was a huge cable cam set up through these jumps, rumours were it was for an upcoming Anthills Film movie…You can’t blame them though, no matter which way you look the scenery is fantastic as Josh Button demonstrates.There’s more to the track than the jumps at the top! We sat in this rock garden and it doesn’t surprise us Steve Peat was the fastest in timed practice. He studied this rock garden for some time and then proceeded to hit it smooth and fast, won’t back down! Stevie Smith on the other hand ‘rode the buffalo’ laughing and hooting his way down, Josh Bryceland described it like “a monkey in a sidecart”. Josh was commenting that there still wasn’t an obvious line yet while Stevie was saying on this track because it is so fast in some places you are forced to take one line!Before the riders hit the track the UCI actually went through and smashed out various rocks from what riders are calling the ‘rock jungle!’Ben Reid threads the rocks and trees, there are numerous line choices all the way down the track.Sam Hill didn’t hit the track in practice until relatively late, he did a few runs scouting lines, being a new track many riders were taking slightly longer to get up to speed.Aaron Gwin was getting around on board a custom Trek made to commemorate his overall 2012 World Cup series win. Things weren’t going all his way, going down in the rocks, you can see the mud on his right shoulder.This track is a physical one, you could hear how tired all the riders were near the bottom of the track!If you didn’t know it was there you would miss it! Can you see the man carrying the torch cut into the side of the hill?It was good to see Brendan Fairclough back riding, he was doing runs with Andrew Neethling and Sam Hill at various times of the day.Damian Spagnolo always seems to be a bit of a dark horse, he was looking good today.Conditions were good, the biggest issue today was the news the UCI may decide to lower the amount of points female riders are awarded in the series and thus reducing their value on a pro team for the overall teams classification. More news on this issue as we get it.
That wraps up the first day of practice, tomorrow the riders have another practice session followed by qualifying.
