Hits 74
Friday, 09 May 2008
Sunday, May 10, 2008 aribor, Slovenia.
The first NISSAN UCI World Cup was met with much anticipation and
excitement. Websites were buzzing all week with news from the event and
journalists and television crews were all over the beautiful Pohorje
Mountain situated on the outskirts of the city of Maribor in Slovenia.
The outing for the Syndicate was successful and dismal all in the same
day with Steve Peat and Greg Minnaar headlining the highlights as they
finished 3rd and 5th respectively while Josh Bryceland suffered a
massive get-off at the end of the rock garden while having a screamer
of a run.
Here’s how the week went:
The Maribor downhill course is a popular one. Starting on the ski
slope, it quickly enters the dark, root filled woods, and is known for
it’s long rock garden section, even though some of it is man-made and
cemented into place. The course is flowing but fast and pretty rough in
places. Race morning Josh Bryceland says, “My practice has gone really
good so far. I’m feeling really confident after last weeks race in
Italy. I’ve been doing things on the track here and I am really excited
about the race today.” Peat says, “Practice has been going good. We’ve
made a couple of changes to my bike and it feels way better, I feel
solid on the course. My mechanic ‘Rick Bobby’ has been making my bike
feel like a new bike each day.”
The Santa Cruz V-10’s were dialed in each run by the ace Syndicate
mechanics, Doug Hatfield, Rick Clarkson, Nigel Reeve and Iain
Bryceland. Hatfield says, “Each run here we’ve made changes to the
bikes. It’s all a progression going forward. Every change to the bikes
just leads us up to the start of the race. We’ve adjusted the
suspension settings and made brake changes sizing rotors up, and then
down, and changing pad compounds. The track has been wicked hard on the
brakes at this event.” Clarkson says, “The training speeds have been
getting faster and faster each day, so we’ve made all the adjustments
accordingly. The bikes are dialed.”
DOWNHILL QUALIFIER:
The qualifier went pretty well for the Syndicate boys with all of
them placing in the top ten. Steve “Old School” Peat delivered the
goods with a second place finish to Julien Camellini just .16 behind
him. Minnaar posted the fastest split time of the morning, then came
fourth to Sam Hill’s third place finish, just .15 behind Sam. The
competition is fierce with less than a second separating the top four.
Peat says, “You’ve got to push in the qualifier, it’s a world cup and
you get points for it. My run went pretty good and I pedaled hard, and
I made some mistakes. I know where I can take some time off.”
Minnaar said, “My run was steady and smooth on top, but I made two
big mistakes at the bottom, but I would rather do it now than later.”
Rennie made some mistakes and came 10th. Bryceland was not pleased with
his effort but still cracked the top ten ahead of Rennie with a 9th
place finish.
DOWNHILL FINAL:
As the downhill unfolded Rennie was the first of the squad to
attempt to improve on his qualifier, but couldn’t get past the arm-pump
and finished 21st. Bryceland was on the hill at the same time Rennie
was finishing and all eyes were on the big screen. With Freecaster
broadcasting the race live, much of the world could see Josh pinning it
into the rock garden and witnessed his crash which spit him into the
air, superman style, pummeling him into the stumps at the bottom.
Cedric Gracia describes it saying, “He was 4 meters high, and flew so
far, he was going so fast. He slammed into the ground, I can’t believe
he didn’t die.” After a few minutes we could see on the big screen Josh
walking away from the crash…but his injuries weren’t apparent right
away.
Next up was Minnaar looking like he was having a good run, and his
efforts gave him a 5th place finish. Normally that would be a podium
finish, but UCI has decided to make the podium a 3-person presentation
rather than the traditional five, so it was quite a disappointment that
he wasn’t on the podium. The decision is not a popular one, and riders
and teams are against it. We all want UCI to change back to a
five-person podium and will lobby for reinstatement of this.
Peaty’s race run was solid and proves that “Old School” has what it
takes to stay on the blocks in this sport. As Bryceland was in the
ambulance he asked the driver to wait a moment so that he could watch
his mentor race by, and Peat raced to the bottom placing 3rd to Julien
Camellini, and race winner, Sam Hill. Peat says, “I’m happy to finish
on the podium. I feel really confident on my revamped V-10. I’m not
happy to get beat by Julien or Sam. The track got a lot drier and I
made some mistakes on the top, then settled into my run and picked up
my pace, but it wasn’t enough.”
Minnaar says, “I knew I had a lot more in me after the qualifier,
at least a few seconds. I think I tried too hard at the top of the
woods and overshot a few corners and didn’t have much flow up top.
Exiting the woods I didn’t carry as much speed as I wanted through the
middle and at the bottom I tried to make up time. The middle worked
well, but the bottom I tried too hard and lost time. I’m happy with my
result, but not with my race run.”
In the meantime, Bryceland was met at first aid by his mom, Luisa.
On radio contact she reported that it appeared that he was badly
bruised, had a chipped tooth and was okay. Yet as they were leaving the
tent he became nauseous, and his smashed up helmet was clear evidence
of a concussion. He was then taken to the hospital for observation and
it was revealed that he suffered a leg injury, which at this time
appears to be a quad muscle torn from the bone. He will be flying home
to the UK to have surgery to repair the damage.
4X Notes:
The 4X was a funny one, looked more like a bowling alley with
racers littering the lanes in nearly every heat. 20th place qualifier,
Nathan Rennie, aka: the “Beast”, raced the 4X here and survived the
crashes that he got tangled in, and was eliminated in his second heat.
Brian Lopes got caught up in the gate in his first round, then his
skewer came loose and he was eliminated in the first round. First place
qualifier, Dan Atherton had his hopes dashed in his second heat as he
was eliminated and American; Ross Milan 4th place qualifier was out in
the second round with Nathan. “These guys don’t even know how to corner
a bike. It was just carnage everywhere. Two guys crashed in front of me
and I had no choice but to hit them. One guy was hurt for sure and the
other guy’s bike was mangled,” said Rennie.
Next up for the Syndicate, we are off to Lisbon for the annual Lisbon Downtown Race.
DOWNHILL FINAL RESULTS:
1) SAM HILL (Monster /Iron Horse) 2:47.54
2) JULIEN CAMELLINI (Chain Reaction Cycles/Intense) 2:50.62
3) STEVE PEAT (SANTA CRUZ SYNDICATE) 2:51.85
4) FABIEN BAREL (Subaru) 2:52.11
5) GREG MINNAAR (SANTA CRUZ SYNDICATE) 2:52.19
6) GEE ATHERTON (Animal Commencal) 2:52.34
7) CHRIS KOVARIK (Chain Reaction Cycles/Intense) 2:52.52
8) JUSTIN LEOV (Yeti) 2:52.56
9) BRENDAN FAIRCLOUGH (Monster/Iron Horse) 2:54.23
10) ANDREW NEETHLING (GT/Mongoose) 2:55.49
21) NATHAN RENNIE (SANTA CRUZ SYNDICATE) 2:57.76
DNF: JOSH BRYCELAND (SANTA CRUZ SYNDICATE)
DOWNHILL QUALIFIER RESULTS:
1) JULIEN CAMELLINI (Chain Reaction Cycles/Intense) 2:52.66
2) STEVE PEAT (SANTA CRUZ SYNDICATE) 2:52.82
3) SAM HILL (Monster Iron Horse) 2:53.21
4) GREG MINNAAR (SANTA CRUZ SYNDICATE) 2:53.36
5) FABIEN BAREL (Subaru)
6) FLORENT PAYET (Subaru)
7) MARC BEAUMONT (MBUK/SANTA CRUZ)
8) CHRIS KOVARIK (Chain Reaction Cycles/Intense) 2:55.
9) JOSH BRYCELAND (SANTA CRUZ SYNDICATE) 2:56.76
NATHAN RENNIE (SANTA CRUZ SYNDICATE) 2:57.08
Thanks to the SYNDICATE Sponsors:
Santa Cruz Bicycles
SRAM
RockShox
Truvativ
Avid
Maxxis
DT Swiss
WTB
Crankbrothers
Lizard Skins
Clif Bar
Troy Lee Designs
Chris King
Source: Santa Cruz
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