Its been so long I'd almost forgotten but the first race is this weekend. A bit annoyed that MSN wasn't on the schedule but found I'd overlooKed it being the venue for this year's Worlds.
A quick course preview for the year here (I watched all of the vids whilst uploading files - DH and getting paid to watch it!:
https://www.pinkbike.com/news/downhill-world-cup-2019-tracks-previews.html
https://www.redbull.com/int-en/tv/live/AP-1XJS6F2JW2111/mercedes-benz-uci-mountain-bike-world-cup
Next weekend isn't it? 27/28th on red bull but good to see it back again!!
I thought it was next weekend as well and I'm away with work so will miss it but I'll be happy if it is this week
Yeah it's the 27th/28th. This weekend I think it's the ixs cup which alot of the wc lot are using as a warm up for wc weekend.
D'Oh I'm out by a week!
A combination of Easter this weekend and last weekend riding for 5 days daarn sarf(er). Still looking forward this season.
Yeah should be good. Interesting to see how Gwin, Gee and others get on with new teams. Hope Greenland continues to progress. Personally I would like Hart to take a win if not the series. Some more competition for Rachel Atherton would be good but I won’t hold my breath, although Seagrave impresses me. Oh and Minaar...hopefully he can get back to his best.
So all in all tonnes to look forward to.
I'm really hoping Luca Shaw gets the little bit of luck he needs after those storming nearly runs last year
Yeah fair one Mike. Interesting if the young guns can repeat their surprise results last year.
Finally I can get this thread into the right place in time. It's back!
Lots on PinkBike today. Really looking forward to this and the Baku F1, add in Avengers Endgame and a couple of great rides and this has been a brilliant week.
Can't wait to watch this.
The track looks good, the weather forecast looks grim, the racing will be amazing as always. I just hope the conditions are the same for everyone. There's nothing worse than a storm rolling in half way through the men's race.
I've been following it since the 90's so I fully appreciate the sheer amount of high quality coverage we get to enjoy these days. And all in real time, not 6 months later on a 20 quid VHS tape.
balls!! going to Baku for work next weekend! slipped up there
but back to proper sport - just watched WynTV, got my all fired up for the race! cant wait
Are they racing Sat or Sun this year?
I’m sofa bound with a sore knee so this is great news.
Friday 26 April
• 08:30-11:45 // Official Downhill Training - Group B
• 12:00-15:15 // Official Downhill Training - Group A
• 15:30-17:00 // Downhill Timed Training Session (World Cup Top 60 Men Elite, Top 15 Women Elite, Top 10 Men Juniors and Top 3 Women Juniors)
• 17:00-17:45 // On Foot Downhill Course Inspection - Riders and Teams
Saturday 27 April
• 08:30-10:00 // Official Downhill Training - Group B
• 10:15-11:45 // Official Downhill Training - Group A
• 12:15 // Seeding Run - Junior Women
• 12:30 // Qualifying Round - Junior Men
• 13:30 // Qualifying Round - Elite Women
• 14:00 // Qualifying Round - Elite Men
Sunday 28 April
• 08:15-09:15 // Official Downhill Training - Junior Women, Junior Men, Elite Women
• 09:45 // Final - Junior Women
• 10:15 // Final - Junior Men
• 11:00-12:00 // Official Downhill Training - Elite Men
• 12:30 // Final - Elite Women
• 13:30 // Final - Elite Men
Are they racing Sat or Sun this year?
Meribor race day is Sunday but I think for the rest of the season they swap race day with the XC guys.
The STW youtube channel said Hart has been beaten by Walker in most of pre-season races?
Cannot wait for this. So many interesting things to look at. French domination to continue? Gee and Rachel on the Atherton bikes, Shaw getting some luck, Greenland pushing on, Seagrave really pushing for wins, new bike again for Gwin.
Should be brilliant. Hope whatever the conditions, it's the same for all. Slightly spoilt (for me) the start of last season when the first few races were so different top to bottom as riders went out.
Hype hype! Gwin and Atherton to win!
The STW youtube channel said Hart has been beaten by Walker in most of pre-season races?
Yeah but it's only 2 races. The British round at Rheola and Maribor IXS last weekend. He must have levelled up in the off season. Hopefully Danny will be back to his downright dangerous best on Sunday. Surely the best rider to watch when he's absolutely frothing for it.
Just been watching #cathrovision - course looks ready to churn up:)
Also, we've (we the UK) got Mikayla Parton riding her first WC...straight in Elite!
Has everyone done their fantasy DH on Pinkbike?
it's forecast to rain for finals!
YAAASSSS !!!
I’d like to see Jack Moir do well and stay injury free this year.
What's going on with the Gee Course Preview. I keep seeing links to it and they're all dead!
As Town get relegated from the Premier League (see Soccerball thread) come on the mad Huddersfield bastard!
Timed training results are on pinkbike
https://www.pinkbike.com/news/results-timed-training-maribor-dh-world-cup-2019.html
What’s going on with the Gee Course Preview. I keep seeing links to it and they’re all dead!
Can't see it elsewhere, but it is on the Red Bull Bike Facebook page.
Timed training is up on PB (along with a RW gondola interview with Finn Iles).. not sure you can read much into it though (as ever!) as the weather is likely to change come Sunday.
oooh ta frogstomp - looks great!
Just watched Gee's course preview - what a track!
Looking forward to Sunday.
Those roots & clay are gonna be horrendous in the wet.
Ooh Baby I like it RAW
Ben Cathro given more than 3 minutes on course for his preview is good.
I’m really hoping Luca Shaw gets the little bit of luck he needs after those storming nearly runs last year
Out with a broken collar bone. Gutted for him.
Quali times are up.
Live timing here:
https://prod.chronorace.be/angular/results.html#/uci/event/20190327_dh/DHI/ME/dh/2/res
I wont spoil it for a couple of hours
Hearing that it rained during qualis so that has probably affected results
Believe it started raining at end of womens quali so track conditions will be changing during the mens. Hopefully consistent track conditions for all tomorrow.
Well that was a bit excruciating for Minnaar in the preview. Also has Warner got a new job as a Swiss policeman?!😂
that was awesome!
(Minnaar. not Luigi's facial hair)
Is Greg not racing tomorrow? Im away with work and the internet is slow to nonexistent so looking this up isnt as easy as it should be. Didnt see his name on the list of qualifying times and with last years injuries i dont think hes a ptotected rider any more
Saw on Instagram, Minaar didn’t make the cut for the first time in 20yrs of racing.
Notable riders who won't be racing tomorrow:
• Greg Minnaar
• Phil Atwill
• Wyn Masters
• Greg Williamson
• Kade Edwards
• Jackson Frew
• Thomas Estaque
• Florent Payet
• Matthew Walker (NZL)
• Max Hartenstern
• Henry Fitzgerald
• Bruce Klein
• Magnus Manson
• Angel Suarez
Well... that’s my fantasy league ****ed ha ha
Gutted for Phil Atwill, Wyn Masters and Greg Minnaar - can't believe the GOAT isn't racing tomorrow!
Go on then, I'll put a tenner on Gwin equalising Minnaar's record. I reckon he'll surpass it this season anyway, he's got 8 opportunities to do it.
What happened there? I know it rained, but why were plenty of the people who are good in the wet (Hart, Atherton, etc) so far down?
JP
Looking forward to today's race..
For those who like to geek out on the stats, check out Eliot Jacksons World Cup Stats website - interesting to compare riders and where they made up / lost time.
Good race. Solid results for the GB riders as well.
My missus wasn’t watching directly but overheard and laughed hard at the ‘it was so big it blew his goggles right off’ comment on vergiers crash.
Well, i for one am surprised at the lack of performance from Gwin?
In fact, the "Old boys" (and girls) are all rather getting whipped by the young guns these days!
Gwin still looks fast and is normally super consistent.
Danny off to an unusually good start so hoping he'll take the overall this year.
That was fun. Picked Bruni in my pinkbike fantasy DH and think he will be a contender.
Great track!
Loic was flying today, looked super quick, on the edge yet in control the whole way down.
Feel bad for Finn cos he looked equally hot all weekend.
Not a fan of the mullet bikes, but we will see how the season goes. Couldn't hope for a better kick off though.
Thanks red bull TV for having "[riders name] winning run" on the homepage so I knew who won before I watched it... Was only a few hours after it was live as well.
^^^
Yes absolutely fuming with that. No way to avoid it on the replay. Seriously hacked off.
I thought exactly the same. Avoided the forum for a few hours with a view to watching the re-run in the evening.
Ran the app and was greeted by the result and 'trending' videos about the winning runs.
Going to complain to Red Bull but doubt it will make any difference.
Great riding though.
You only have to look at the 'From The Front Page' sidebar >> to see who won the juniors...
On the other hand well done to Andi for getting the stuff up over the weekend, in the past we could had to wait a day or two to get DH results and news up.
Its the same with the bar at the bottom of the video if youre on catch up, it would br better if they just had the riders names rather than names and times
Missed the girls racing as I was out. Saw the end of the mens. Well done to Danny, and Tahnee, Rachel. Glad Tracey did well too. Hopefully there's a rerun.
Same thing with seeing the winner on Red Bull. Absolutely gutted.
Once watching the race, there was still plenty of excitement, but it definitely lost something seeing the winner's run against the runner up.
[at what point can we include spoilers?]
Anyway - If anyone is reading this before watching the race (you idiot), get someone else to start the replay for you so you don't see the winner by accident.
Have emailed Red Bull. Doubt it will do anything but worth a try. Next time I will get someone to start it for me.
Really enjoyed the woman's race as well. Hopefully at least a 2 way battle this year.
I tweeted them too - and it looks like many on Pinkbike feel foul to the same thing 🙁
RB did exactly the same at least twice last year year - caught me out several times. 🙁
RedBull app / web page is shocking and afaik always has been.
Was watching the Womens race about 20 mins behind, suddenly it decided to leap to live, which happened to be a slow-mo replay of the Winning run.
Often, despite having a 150Mbps connection at home, it will run at such low quality you can't read the on-screen graphics.
It's also too cool for it's own good, the web page, the Xbox App and the Roko app are all the same, no 'buttons' on-screen, just a sort of gesture control for a non-touch interface, shite.
Glad I'm not the only one that was caught out by the on screen spoilers. What a pisser that was.
I'd already learned not to start watching the replay until the whole thing has finished because it had a habit of jumping to the live feed.
Then they found a new way to ruin it anyway!
Hell of a race though. Hart did his usual 'win or die trying' which was eye opening but Bruni was just .4 of a second cleaner.
Bring back Freecaster I say!
I know they used about 4 cameras for the whole track, it was in such low-res it looked like an 8-Bit computer game, it would often just go off for 20 mins without explanation and Warner was so pissed by the time the fastest qualifier started his run he was completely incoherent. But they never gave away the result ha ha.
Was watching... about 20 mins behind, suddenly it decided to leap to live, which happened to be a slow-mo replay of the Winning run
Yup, this. Grrrr.
Bring back Freecaster I say!
Yup, this.
To be fair, I thought the camera coverage of this race was superb. Even though you're only seeing a part of the track, it felt like you caught everything (and obviously did catch the couple of important crashes).
Agreed, it was the best race I've watched in the last few years.
Good camera angles covering most of the best bits of track. The racing was nice and close all the way through which kept it interesting until the final run.
I never watch it through the app - it’s SO unreliable! However it works pretty well through a browser on my phone.
Watched it live direct on my TV through the Firestick. It did crash a few times but didn't spoil anything.
Loved it! some great racing!
Some good racing, both the womens and the mens seemed pretty open. Agreed that it looked a good course but then I'm not racing it. Loved Laurie Greendlands run, on the edge all the way down.
Thought it funny that they mentioned Brook Macdonald was happy with the new Michelins then seemed to be having trouble staying upright all the way down (I guess Laurie was on those as well as they support Mondraker?)
