Qualifying has wrapped in the downhill at Les Gets for the World Champs with the first scalps of the weekend being taken.
While qualifying doesn’t mean all that much at World Champs like it does at a World Cup, for many, it’s their first opportunity to ride a track without much traffic on it. Qualifying doesn’t even dictate the running order for Saturday’s finals…
Here’s who did what in qualifying.
Junior Women
Izabela Yankova showed that she’s reveling in the steep, dusty terrain in Les Gets by putting four and a half seconds into Kiwi Jenna Hastings. Gracey Hemstreet, fresh from being picked up by Red Bull, slots into third.
It looks like Phoebe Gale had a cruiser of a run, so expect her to come out swinging on Saturday.
Junior Men
We know Jackson Goldstone crashed in his run, so it should be another good battle between him and Junior Men’s quali winner Jordan Williams on Saturday. Canada’s Bodhi Kuhn continued his run of form to finish up third.
Elite Women
Nothing short of a statement from Myriam Nicole. She’ll want to defend the stripes and take a home win. It’s all going well so far with most of the usual names going for a hot lap. Six and a half seconds up on Nina Hoffman, with Eleonora Farina 0.8 back on the Syndicate rider.
Camille Balanche slotted into 6th, with our pal Louise Ferguson just behind her in 7th.
Elite Men
Benoit Coulanges was another French Commencal rider to come out hot, pipping Amaury Pierron by just 0.24 of a second. Angel Suarez started slow but built into a heater to finish third. Thibaut Daprela was fastest at all four splits before going two and a half back at the finish line.
Laurie Greenland is fighting off the effects of a bad kebab so just broke the timing beam. Danny Hart was way down the pack but might just be saving his strength for Saturday.
It’s looking highly likely that your 2022 UCI Downhill World Champion in Elite Men will be on a Commencal folks…
Seven seconds separate the top 20 though, so anything could happen, especially if it rains.
