October 11 2020
2020 UCI Mountain Bike World Championships
Insane! That was an unforgettable World Championships, in some of the toughest conditions we’ve ever seen.. otherwise known as an average weekend at the British Downhill Series!
Crashes for Danny and Matt put them out of the race for gold, but they weren’t alone, as almost every rider had their troubles in the steep and boggy woods.
The good news is that up until the halfway mark both were on the pace, so we’re now ready to get stuck into the first of four World Cup rounds.
Never have we been more excited to be heading to Maribor and the reassuring solidity of their rock garden…
Day one and this was the best the bikes looked all week... from here in, every part was subjected to brutal punishment as mud coated every place imaginable.
Track walk. Who would think that these would have been classed as some of the best conditions we saw all week?!
Practice day one - Danny sends it into the blue skies...
Matt through the rocks up top.
Day two on track and a very different scene. Rain, mud, ruts and packed tyres. Oh and the curveball that qualification results would become race results, if the race was cancelled due to snow.
On this track, it was a case of surviving the crashes. Everyone went down at some point and this time it was Danny's turn.
Danny and Matt had solid qualification runs, but had room to improve on a challenging track. We were in the camp hoping for no snow, and therefore a chance to race again.
There was snow - but thankfully racing was on! Conditions were even more demanding than before though.
Matt's race run was going great until these woods! Somewhere under there are some spiked tyres designed to cut through the mud. Might have been a bit deeper than anyone was expecting though...
Danny was one of the big pre-race favourites, but when the man who mastered Champery goes down, you probably have to acknowledge that this track was like nothing we have ever seen before. Absolutely wild!
Danny drops into the finish and the jetwash has already been primed - see you in Maribor where we are hoping to have cleaned up and dried out a bit.
Tagged: Team