Events: '08 Bromont WC XC Report

Chris Snedden--somewhere in the pain cave, lap 4. Colin Meagher

The men
In the men's race, Adam Craig was opting to continue running the chain guide and single chain ring combo that had served him well at Mt Snow and Mt St Anne; but given the aggressive nature of the climbs, the new, awesome Giant algorithm for determining maximum fun meant a 32 tooth front ring instead of his 35 tooth rig from the last two races. Julien Absalon was looking for some confidence heading into the Olympics, so he stayed in Canada to play in the mud, too. And Geoff Kabush was in it to win it, as well. Again not stacked with some Euros resting for the Olympics, but not a cream puff field, either.

Kind of forgotten in all those names was Todd Wells, America's strongest rider on the world cup this season so far. Pretty much out of the gate, he was charging hard and led the main bunch up the first climb. But somewhere out there, Jose Hermida got out front, and was holding the lead heading into the second major climb, with Julien right on his wheel. Todd was still in it, sitting third at that point, but then the wheels came off a bit with a couple of flats. He still managed to get tenth, so good damage control by Todd.

Absalon eventually got out front in the middle of lap two, and put it on cruise control to take the win by a bit over 2 minutes over runner-up Lukas Fluckiger, a 24 year old out of Germany. Another minute thirty back was none other than Adam Craig, wheelie-ing, possibly the filthiest bike I've ever seen, across the finish line. I'm not sure if that MRP chain guide helped much, but it sure didn't hurt. Geoff Kabush was back another minute and change for the fourth step, and Jose Hermida took the last podium step.

For a photo gallery from this event go HERE.

Jose Hermida with a real "dirty Sanchez". Colin Meagher

Not fun! Colin Meagher

Reader Comments 

Posted Fri Aug15, 2008, 2:17 AM — By zoran

Dont buy movies, get online bootleg movie downloads movies and watch them for free. Earn money and work from home, with online forex, trade the forex market.

Add Comment

Name (Required):

Email (Required, will not be shown to public):

Comment (Required, max chars: 1024):

You have characters left.

Type the characters you see in this picture