From suburban Canberra (where I expect there were a couple of hangovers), back to the slopes of Stromlo today for the under 19 mens XC race. The Italians were back in force with Gerhard Kerschbaumer winning the race to take his second gold medal & rainbow jersey after being part of the winning Italian team in the Team Relay.
As usual Russ Baker has loads of great pics.
More info on today’s XC race is on MTB Worlds Canberra: Kerschbaumer wins double gold for Italy
This afternoon as the temperature dropped, the 4X track started to heat up. In the 4X qualifying current Australian mens 4X champ, Jared Graves qualified first for the men. In the womens 4X Canberra’s favourite & current Australian womens 4X champ, Caroline Buchanan qualified second, about a third of a second behind American Jill Kintner.
In the Trials 20″ class semi-finals Spaniards Ros Charral and Abel Mustieles topped their respective elite mens and junior mens categories. Unfortunately the Aussies in the 20″ class failed to progress to finals.
Meanwhile the downhillers are still practicing for the big event on Sunday. There’s a bit of whinging about the final section of the track being too pedally, and so some riders are opting for lighter bikes (personally, I’d be going for the biggest bike I could lay my hands on). Dirt Mag UK once again have some good video of the downhill for today.
Tomorrow (Friday)
Both 20″ and 26″ classes for the womens trials will be run and won, starting at 9:15.
From 10:30 there will be timed runs for downhill (hopefully high speed, top to bottom with no stuffing around).
The under 23 mens XC race will be run at 2pm.
The 4X finals will be run under lights, starting at 6:30pm. This should draw a huge and very excited crowd – as the Aussies are looking very good in both the mens and womens. The 4X racing will be followed by partying (hopefully celebration for the Aussies) at the bar with DJ Kid Kenobi and MC Shureshock pumping the tunes.
If you are planning to head out tomorrow, just remember that you will need to pay for a ticket to get in – and you can get a discount if you purchase your ticket online, rather than paying at the gate.
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