Finally the time has arrived when all of the off-season bullshit finally stops.
It’s time to let the riders put the times in and to see who has been working hard over the last 5 months since they crossed the finish line in the epic Val Di Sole World Champs.
Big Dave is Team Wideopenmag’s Manager – he loves racing and he loves World Cups. Here’s what he thinks about this weekend’s race and what he’s getting excited about.
Take it away Dave!
What better place to get the season underway than amongst the jagged rocks, big jumps, loose dirt that is offered by the Pic Du Jer above the holy city of Lourdes?
Last year, it brought in crowds of 35,000 and it certainly put on a hell of a show when it came to the racing. This year they are predicting 250 riders from 27 different nations, putting on an epic spectacle in front of 122 journalists and 40,000 fans.
The track
The track itself is 1752m long, with 430m descent. It’s a monster.
There are some real stand out features; one of the most intimidating has got to be the wall. With a near vertical drop, rocks scattered left, right and centre and straight into a left hand corner. It’s super testing on both bikes and riders and was a scene of carnage last year, with nearly every rider ending up with dirt on their jersey at some point over the weekend.
The track team have put in some work to mix it up from last year. There are some tricky rock sections, big road gaps, fresh loose loamy turns and the track ends with a massive step down into the finish arena to keep the fans hyped.
Who went well last year?
Last years event was won by Aaron Gwin on his debut for the YT MOB and Rachel Atherton on her way to winning every world cup main event and world champs in 2016.
However, these weren’t your fastest qualifiers, Bruni had gone fastest in the mens and Tahnee Seagrave had put in a stormer to take the top qualifying spot for the women. Bruni then crashed out in the finals and Seagrave couldn’t match her top quali spot in the drier conditions on Sunday, but still bagged a solid second place.
Who surprised us last year?
https://www.instagram.com/p/BSjcn5OhJ6z/
Never rule out the Frenchies on this track. It is one that is part of their national circuit and you have little doubt that they have put in a lot of testing and know each and every part of the track.
Last year, Lac Blanc Commencal rider Amaury Pierron stunned everyone with a blistering run to bag the final podium spot. Sadly he went on to injure himself just after Lourdes, so it’s difficult to say if this was a one off or if he had hit some epic form.
Movers and Shakers this year.
Regarding any movement of teams amongst the top riders, the biggest two has got to be the introduction of the Canyon Factory Racing Team and the Radon team.
Canyon has got Fabien Barel managing them and with Troy Brosnan spearheading the team with Ruariadh Cunningham (sadly injured for Lourdes) and Mark Wallace as team mates, they are looking like a force to be reckoned with.
https://www.instagram.com/p/BTGOboDljCY/
Lourdes will be Manon Carpenter’s first season on her new Radon team – having moved away from Madison Saracen where she won her World Champs Junior title, overall World Cup and elite champs title. She raced 156 times with those guys!
She’s back training with Alan Milway who helped her take champs and overall World Cup titles in 2014. Could this be her year to challenge Rachel Atherton?
The Santa Cruz Syndicate has changed to include Loris Vergier and Luca Shaw – a super big hitting team. You’d be crazy to rule those guys out. These guys alongside Minnaar look incredibly strong – the young guns are race winning contenders for sure and you would be a fool to ever bet against Greg – he is the GOAT.
The rest of the field is largely unchanged, other than the graduation of some of the juniors into the elite ranks. Look out for Gaetan Vige who has moved to Scott Velosolutions alongside Brendan Fairclough – this could be a killer combination for the French hillside.
Pit Gossip
The rumour mill has been going mad over this off season over the potential of some teams tunring up with some 29er DH bikes. A photo surfaced appearing to show Fox looking at development of a ‘Fox 49’ bolted to what appears to be a Mondraker …
Originally, I had thought that it would be unlikely that we would see the 29er DH bike rolled out of the pits at Lourdes, but the Santa Cruz Syndicate spearheaded by Greg Minnaar have put that thought to rest by unveiling their wagon wheeled V10 two days ahead of the first practice in Lourdes.
In our minds, with Greg as the pilot, there’s no doubt that the 29’er V10 is capable of a race winning time. Just in case though, the Santa Cruz guys have said they’ve got Greg’s 650b V10’s on hand so he can chop and change if needed. It’ll be interesting to see what he ends up on come Sunday afternoon.
What’s interesting is the journey Greg and Santa Cruz have undergone to get the bike ready for race day.
Some of the other top riders have been vocal about their dislike towards 29” DH bikes, however, if the V10 and any other 29” DH bikes put in a convincing performance at Lourdes, I can foresee a race for other top flight teams to get their riders on 29” DH bikes.
Other teams to look out for on a 29er DH bike this weekend? Trek Factory Racing, Mondraker and the Cube Global Squad maybe? I know that Trek have been testing one!
Who do we think is going to win?
We had a strawpole survey here at Wideopen and here’s what we reckon… BUT, this was done before we heard Rach Atherton is unwell.
Team Manager Dave
Gwin Bruni, Hart
Atherton, Nicole, Seagrave
Rich T
Hart, Gwin, Brosnan
Atherton, Nicole, Seagrave
Pete
Vergier, Gwin, Hart
Atherton, Seagrave, Carpenter
Veronique
Bruni, Hart, Brosnan
Atherton, Seagrave, Nicole
Our mate Scout from Ti Springs:
Gwin, Bruni, Minnaar
Atherton, Seagrave, Carpenter
Where to watch the race
You can watch the race live on Redbull.
We’ll publish the link on Wideopen’s facebook on Sunday … but if you want to bookmark it now it’s here:
Redbull live World Cup DH coverage Lourdes.
Coverage will start from:
USA: 4am (PDT) 7am (EDT)
British Summer Time: 12pm << UK viewers
Malaysia: 7pm
Australia: 9pm (Sydney)
New Zealand: 11pm (Auckland)
