UCI Mountain Bike World Cup – successful World Cup premiere in Leogang

The UCI World Cup premiere in Leogang was a big success for the organizers, teams and last but not least for the riders – despite the very challenging tracks. 402 riders from 32 different countries from all over the world and over 8,000 spectators throughout the weekend made their way to Leogang. Despite the changing weather conditions, the atmosphere and the good mood of the spectators as well as attendees increased from day to day. The highlight of the long World Cup weekend were marked by the final runs of the Fourcross and Downhill disciplines who guaranteed a big bag of high class mountain bike race action. Jared Graves and Anneke Beerten dominated their class in the  Fourcross race and took the win. Also Sabrina Jonnier and Greg Minnaar both scored first place points at the 3rd round of the Downhill World Cup. But that’s not all. A packed side program included a big welcome party, an international football match of the Austrian soccer champion Red Bull Salzburg, live concerts and after show parties. Besides the racetrack the expo area was worth a journey too, because lots of different bike sport brands were represented there.

On Thursday June 17th, the long weekend of the UCI World Cup started with the first training session on Leogang’s official and brand new World Cup Fourcross track. The riders had only two days to practice the new course. The Fourcross final runs on Saturday featured a lot of exciting battles. In the end two well-known riders made their way to the top of the podium. Australian Jared Graves and Anneke Beerten from the Netherlands dominated successfully the big peloton of riders and won finally the Fourcross finals. On Sunday midday, the downhill finals started with the women runs and followed directly by the men finals. The challenging forest sections of the downhill track weren’t easy to handle, but the riders showed a great performance and the fans were cheering for the athletes as much as possible.

The seeding run was dominated by Rachel Atherton. But in the finals Rachel crashed and couldn’t score any big points that time, so everybody that waited for his idol was feeling for her. The victory of the 3rd round of the DH World Cup in the women category went to Sabrina Jonnier who won once again and extended her lead in the overall World Cup. Her French colleagues Emmeline Ragot and Floriane Pugin came in 2nd and 3rd place.

The men’s finals were again thrilling and exciting until the very end.
Steve Peat was one of the first top riders who stayed a while on the hot seat. Peaty had a crash in his seeding run, so re were 37 more riders to fight for the hot seat. 25 riders later the “Kiwi” Cameron Cole took over the hot seat from Peaty, but he didn’t stay up there for too long. It was Gee Atherton that made the crowds scream most on that day. Gee was flying down the mountain and the time stopped at 4:06.39 which was 5.38 seconds faster than the leader Cameron Cole. This was unreal. But there were still four of the world’s fastest riders to come. Matti Lehikonen who raced well all weekend was next, he couldn’t get even close to Gee’s time and stayed nearly 7 seconds behind Mr. Atherton. Aaron Gwin who had amazing races this year cam down fast, but also missed Gee’s time by nearly 4 seconds. Then the South African World Cup winner from 2009, Greg Minnaar, was next and everyone knew that if anyone had the guns to beat Gee’s time, it was Greg. Greg went really fast and clean, you could tell how well is prepared for this year. When Greg crossed the finish line the time stopped at 4:05.65! Greg was on the Hot Seat, waiting for one more rider. It was New Zealand’s Sam Blenkinsop, but Sam had a few mistakes, so he couldn’t beat Greg’s time and ended up in 4th place.

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