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Maribor, Slovenia
The first NISSAN UCI World Cup was met with much anticipation and excitement. Websites were buzzing all week with news from the event and journalists and television crews were all over the beautiful Pohorje Mountain situated on the outskirts of the city of Maribor in Slovenia. The outing for the Syndicate was successful and dismal all in the same day with Steve Peat and Greg Minnaar headlining the highlights as they finished 3rd and 5th respectively while Josh Bryceland suffered a massive get-off at the end of the rock garden while having a screamer of a run.
Here’s how the week went:
The Maribor downhill course is a popular one. Starting on the ski slope, it quickly enters the dark, root filled woods, and is known for it’s long rock garden section, even though some of it is man-made and cemented into place. The course is flowing but fast and pretty rough in places. Race morning Josh Bryceland says, “My practice has gone really good so far. I’m feeling really confident after last weeks race in Italy. I’ve been doing things on the track here and I am really excited about the race today.” Peat says, “Practice has been going good. We’ve made a couple of changes to my bike and it feels way better, I feel solid on the course. My mechanic ‘Rick Bobby’ has been making my bike feel like a new bike each day.”
The Santa Cruz V-10’s were dialed in each run by the ace Syndicate mechanics, Doug Hatfield, Rick Clarkson, Nigel Reeve and Iain Bryceland. Hatfield says, “Each run here we’ve made changes to the bikes. It’s all a progression going forward. Every change to the bikes just leads us up to the start of the race. We’ve adjusted the suspension settings and made brake changes sizing rotors up, and then down, and changing pad compounds. The track has been wicked hard on the brakes at this event.” Clarkson says, “The training speeds have been getting faster and faster each day, so we’ve made all the adjustments accordingly. The bikes are dialed.”
DOWNHILL QUALIFIER:
The qualifier went pretty well for the Syndicate boys with all of them placing in the top ten. Steve “Old School” Peat delivered the goods with a second place finish to Julien Camellini just .16 behind him. Minnaar posted the fastest split time of the morning, then came fourth to Sam Hill’s third place finish, just .15 behind Sam. The competition is fierce with less than a second separating the top four. Peat says, “You’ve got to push in the qualifier, it’s a world cup and you get points for it. My run went pretty good and I pedaled hard, and I made some mistakes. I know where I can take some time off.”
Minnaar said, “My run was steady and smooth on top, but I made two big mistakes at the bottom, but I would rather do it now than later.” Rennie made some mistakes and came 10th. Bryceland was not pleased with his effort but still cracked the top ten ahead of Rennie with a 9th place finish.
DOWNHILL FINAL:
As the downhill unfolded Rennie was the first of the squad to attempt to improve on his qualifier, but couldn’t get past the arm-pump and finished 21st. Bryceland was on the hill at the same time Rennie was finishing and all eyes were on the big screen. With Freecaster broadcasting the race live, much of the world could see Josh pinning it into the rock garden and witnessed his crash which spit him into the air, superman style, pummeling him into the stumps at the bottom. Cedric Gracia describes it saying, “He was 4 meters high, and flew so far, he was going so fast. He slammed into the ground, I can’t believe he didn’t die.” After a few minutes we could see on the big screen Josh walking away from the crash…but his injuries weren’t apparent right away.
Next up was Minnaar looking like he was having a good run, and his efforts gave him a 5th place finish. Normally that would be a podium finish, but UCI has decided to make the podium a 3-person presentation rather than the traditional five, so it was quite a disappointment that he wasn’t on the podium. The decision is not a popular one, and riders and teams are against it. We all want UCI to change back to a five-person podium and will lobby for reinstatement of this.
Peaty’s race run was solid and proves that “Old School” has what it takes to stay on the blocks in this sport. As Bryceland was in the ambulance he asked the driver to wait a moment so that he could watch his mentor race by, and Peat raced to the bottom placing 3rd to Julien Camellini, and race winner, Sam Hill. Peat says, “I’m happy to finish on the podium. I feel really confident on my revamped V-10. I’m not happy to get beat by Julien or Sam. The track got a lot drier and I made some mistakes on the top, then settled into my run and picked up my pace, but it wasn’t enough.”
Minnaar says, “I knew I had a lot more in me after the qualifier, at least a few seconds. I think I tried too hard at the top of the woods and overshot a few corners and didn’t have much flow up top. Exiting the woods I didn’t carry as much speed as I wanted through the middle and at the bottom I tried to make up time. The middle worked well, but the bottom I tried too hard and lost time. I’m happy with my result, but not with my race run.”
In the meantime, Bryceland was met at first aid by his mom, Luisa. On radio contact she reported that it appeared that he was badly bruised, had a chipped tooth and was okay. Yet as they were leaving the tent he became nauseous, and his smashed up helmet was clear evidence of a concussion. He was then taken to the hospital for observation and it was revealed that he suffered a leg injury, which at this time appears to be a quad muscle torn from the bone. He will be flying home to the UK to have surgery to repair the damage.
4X Notes:
The 4X was a funny one, looked more like a bowling alley with racers littering the lanes in nearly every heat. 20th place qualifier, Nathan Rennie, aka: the “Beast”, raced the 4X here and survived the crashes that he got tangled in, and was eliminated in his second heat. Brian Lopes got caught up in the gate in his first round, then his skewer came loose and he was eliminated in the first round. First place qualifier, Dan Atherton had his hopes dashed in his second heat as he was eliminated and American; Ross Milan 4th place qualifier was out in the second round with Nathan. “These guys don’t even know how to corner a bike. It was just carnage everywhere. Two guys crashed in front of me and I had no choice but to hit them. One guy was hurt for sure and the other guy’s bike was mangled,” said Rennie.
Next up for the Syndicate, we are off to Lisbon for the annual Lisbon Downtown Race.
DOWNHILL FINAL RESULTS:
1) SAM HILL (Monster /Iron Horse) 2:47.54
2) JULIEN CAMELLINI (Chain Reaction Cycles/Intense) 2:50.62
3) STEVE PEAT (SANTA CRUZ SYNDICATE) 2:51.85
4) FABIEN BAREL (Subaru) 2:52.11
5) GREG MINNAAR (SANTA CRUZ SYNDICATE) 2:52.19
6) GEE ATHERTON (Animal Commencal) 2:52.34
7) CHRIS KOVARIK (Chain Reaction Cycles/Intense) 2:52.52
8) JUSTIN LEOV (Yeti) 2:52.56
9) BRENDAN FAIRCLOUGH (Monster/Iron Horse) 2:54.23
10) ANDREW NEETHLING (GT/Mongoose) 2:55.49
21) NATHAN RENNIE (SANTA CRUZ SYNDICATE) 2:57.76
DNF: JOSH BRYCELAND (SANTA CRUZ SYNDICATE)
DOWNHILL QUALIFIER RESULTS:
1) JULIEN CAMELLINI (Chain Reaction Cycles/Intense) 2:52.66
2) STEVE PEAT (SANTA CRUZ SYNDICATE) 2:52.82
3) SAM HILL (Monster Iron Horse) 2:53.21
4) GREG MINNAAR (SANTA CRUZ SYNDICATE) 2:53.36
5) FABIEN BAREL (Subaru)
6) FLORENT PAYET (Subaru)
7) MARC BEAUMONT (MBUK/SANTA CRUZ)
8) CHRIS KOVARIK (Chain Reaction Cycles/Intense) 2:55.
9) JOSH BRYCELAND (SANTA CRUZ SYNDICATE) 2:56.76
NATHAN RENNIE (SANTA CRUZ SYNDICATE) 2:57.08
Thanks to the SYNDICATE Sponsors:
Santa Cruz Bicycles
SRAM
RockShox
Truvativ
Avid
Maxxis
DT Swiss
WTB
Crankbrothers
Lizard Skins
Clif Bar
Troy Lee Designs
Chris King
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