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XCO & XCC calendar:
12th – 14th April, Mairipora, BRA
19th – 21st April, Araxa Minas Gerais, BRA
25th – 26th May, Nove Mesto Na Morave, CZE
14th – 16th June, Val Di Sole Trentino, ITA
21st – 23rd June, Crans-Montana Valais, FRA
28th June – 7th July, Haute-Savoie, FRA
27th – 29th September, Mt Van Hoevenberg Lake Placid, USA
4th – 6th October, Mont-Sainte-Anne, CAN
As ever, XC tends to get overlooked on MTB websites, but it's worth having a thread. With 2024 being an Olympic year, that's where most riders will be focusing their attention. Most of the top riders have stayed on the same team.
Quite a few riders are already preparing for the season; some in South Africa, and Trek are in Denia with the Lidl-Trek road camp. We've even seen some racing CX in the winter.
And unlike Enduro, or DHI, there don't seem to be too many teams disappearing.
I do hope you didn't type that out by hand!
Really looking forward to it, glad it starts earlier than the DH too.
I am almost convinced its a better spectator sport than DH too - some absolutely brilliant racing last year. For the European rounds at least, Friday tea time short track, live, is brilliant TV.
I am almost convinced its a better spectator sport than DH too – some absolutely brilliant racing last year. For the European rounds at least, Friday tea time short track, live, is brilliant TV.
I didn’t really get into the DH last year. I always seemed to turn in at the wrong time.
The XC on the other hand seemed to step up. It helps that we had a Brit with prospects in the men’s and that they often started at the back
The women’s was also interesting. I liked the Mona effect where she seemed to be able to come back up through the field later in the race
Is there a cheaper way of getting replays of full races than discovery plus? I was planning on stumping up for GCSEs plus this year instead as of just watching the u23 races which they put on YouTube, but £7 a month is too much to justify just for this!
Course preview of the XCO Mairipora.......
U23 XCC tonight, no live coverage. Elite XCC tomorrow, followed by the XCO on Sunday.
What's the thinking in the change of schedule? Normally short track is Friday teatime, which gives a day to recover before the main race on Sunday.
If the short track is now on Saturday, will we see even more riders taking it easy in the race to save themselves for the main event if it is a course that doesn't favour them?
Is it still only on eurosport and discovery+ now?
Watched lats year on gcn, but thats gone now.
The Elite XCC races will take place on Saturdays when there's no DH racing; otherwise they'll be on the Friday evening. The possible reasoning is that organisers want more people at the venue - Friday evenings aren't always as busy as they'd like......so Saturday is a better fit for them.
Most CX racers will ride a race the day before a CX World Cup, and that is for an hour; so a 20 min XCC should be in the capacity for the top XCO racers.
decent start to the season, I'd say
(Caution, spoilers may follow; XCC is done)
Brilliant last lap in the mens race.
For anyone who is (or looks like they are) in Switzerland you can watch on the SRF channel website with native commentary.
Some good racing from the women but the mens race was mental. To race at that speed in that heat, humidity and dust was mental. Really close mens race from start to finish.
Looks like lots of Lance Armstrongs on xc bikes
Great racing, I raced this morning and it’s good to experience that and then a gazillion levels above in the afternoon.
Watched the women’s race just now - the camera work was shite, missed important bits, very poor coverage
I enjoyed the racing today, love some drone coverage.
The course looked loads of fun.
I'm a bit smitten with the Specialized's frame and forks colour scheme 😍
Three - or four? - Spec Epics in the top 10’s, I can’t help thinking that’s a marketeers dream this year, those will be flying off the shelves if they weren’t already.
Have to agree, I'm loving the retro look of the Specialized team.
I’d say 1st and 8th for a small brand like Ibis was good publicity. I thought the womens race was fab. Loved jenny slowing down on the pump track
The coverage needs work. I assume they didn’t have cameras on the whole course. But it looked harder to cover than some courses because of the vegetation. Also not happy that they had as staring at nothing while we waited for the adverts to end and that they labelled the race under 23 when it wasn’t. But still glad to have watched it
Pivot course walk, interesting course.
Good last couple of laps and a great battle between Haley Batten and Jenny Rissveds. Be Intresting to know exactly what happened to Loana LeComte.
I thought the men's race was due to be shown on Eurosport after the women's but they're now showing snooker ....
That caught me out last year with Eurosport though IIRC mine was darts thats why I ended up subscribing to Discovery+
Great last lap there in the men’s race.
Shame we missed loads with the terrible camera work at the end though!
Was bad camera work at the end I thought we were going to actually miss the finish.
Feels sorry for Victor Koretzky, even when he got the chain back on it was still making some strange crunching noises.
Holy moly, that was absolutely fabulous.
Ric said it on the comms - if you think you know what XC racing is based on years past then you need to watch this modern racing. Its like Moto GP mixed with supercross on xc bikes. Incredible.
Specialized will be having a deep dive into what when wrong on Koretzkys bike!
ETA poor Andreassen looked absolutely shell shocked in the interview! Not sure he was fully with it!
what a finish!
Just annoying got to wait till the end of May for the next round.
I'd love to watch the Mont Saint-Anne race. I used to ski there!
Very wet race for the European Championships.
Looks horrendous. Only realised it was being shown, yesterday.
Don't know whats worse the weather or the dire music.
Pauline Ferrand Prévot pulled out.
A week deserved win, not saying who in case someone's watching on catch-up!
The weather just got worse and worse, those women are looking totally wrung out.
Hope the weather picks up for the elite men’s race. Hard to see what is going on through the mist.
Just seen a yt video on the course, looked soggy beforehand. And when did xc courses become so technical?
They started to become technical a few years ago that’s why a lot of modern xc bikes are now 120mm travel. That’s also why some of the Specialized riders were racing the Epic Evo last year as it was more capable on some of the courses than the standard Epic.
The weather was so bad yesterday and 3 degree temp why they left the men’s race as 7 laps the same as the women’s. Even on the men’s podium you could see their teeth chattering as they were still cold.
As someone else said; looked like Wales in the winter. Looked awful. There was a Spanish rider at the end who clearly wasn't used to it, and looked like he was suffering badly
Any rerun or highlights videos anywhere? Only one I've seen was Puck Pieterse's course preview.
Me too, looked a brutal race. I can only find course previews too.
Tiz on the site that probably shouldn't be named or linked to here...
So we have Nove Mesto in two weeks (assuming there is no coverage of the Southern XC). Anyone want to take a punt at the top 3 in the elite men/women XCO?
Found it.
I'll admit as a race it wasn't the most exciting to watch nothing like the first couple of rounds in Brazil but being the European champs some top International racers wasn't there even some of the Euro top racers also missed it.
Due to the weather I think it was just a matter of survival to the end.
Watched it last night. Why isn't the site its on to be named? Seems petty really. However..
I noticed that quite a few riders that would have been running SRAM Transmission were using cable stuff. Wonder if its taking the risk out of it being so wet?
Pidcock follows up winning the Amstel Gold race on the road by winning the Nove Mesto XCO World Cup; being able to do that is pretty special; only MvdP has done that (back in 2019)
And an excellent 4th for Charlie, meaning two Brits in the top 4......Not that long ago a top 10-15 would be good.
And without doing the maths, it looks like GB will get 2 places in the men's Olympic MTB race.....
Enjoyed the elite mens race today. I'd like to give that course a go, looks fun.
Just read the above comment.
been running SRAM Transmission were using cable stuff. Wonder if its taking the risk out of it being so wet?
Isn't the mechanical sram gears lighter than their electric counterpart and also quicker to shift?
Wonder what was going on with Pidock's fork he seemed to fiddle about with a bit.
Wonder what was going on with Pidock’s fork he seemed to fiddle about with a bit.
It'll be the controls for his front wheel motor 🫣
I think Pidcock runs the fully electronic compression control option whereas Prevot runs old-school cable operated manual lock-outs. Maybe the tech was playing up a bit?