Maribor is a beautiful place. Slovenia has the greatest percentage of forested land in any country in all of Europe, so you feel as if you are in the middle of nowhere, when in reality you are on the edge of the second largest city in Slovenia. This place looks to be a mountain biking paradise as the ski resort of Pohorje (the World Cup host) is riddled with trails, all open to biking. Maps of the area reveal even more trails to explore.
The Downhill Track:
The DH track looks to be a mini Mt St Anne, with one exception: the rock garden—more about that later. So far, the racers love the track. There is a bit of a stupid big jump to flat near the top, but the rest is straightforward east coast US style of roots and rock and more roots. I really would not want to ride this track in the wet without sticky rubber tires!
The rock garden is a bit of a beast. There you are, flowing along, roots, baby heads—the usual stuff, when all of the sudden, you enter about a 50-60 yard stretch of nothing but sharp, nasty, big rocks. The kind that make team mechanics grimace, ‘cause if their rider ain’t smooth, they’re gonna be lacing up at least a wheel set a day, and likely replacing a shattered rear derailleur or two as well. I watched 3 rear derailleurs get smashed to bits in about an hour. Oddly enough, I only saw one rider flat in there.
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After that, it’s back to the regular: roots, rocks, more roots.
Sam Hill looked wicked fast, but then again, he always does. Peaty was on fire, too, as well as Fabian Barrel and Gee Atherton. Not sure who else blew by—it’s the first race of the year, so everyone’s in new kits, which makes it hard to sort out who’s who until race day.
The 4X track is alright, but not great. It’s got 3 big straights and one ridiculous set of doubles. As Dan Atherton put it,
“There’s not a lot of places to overtake someone; you either get the hole shot, or you get nothing”.
That hole shot looks to be the second turn, a sweeping right-hander. The scare index ratchets up a bit on the final straight where that big double is; the course chokes up a bit in that straight, and if some eager beaver goes for the pass in there and bumps another rider mid air, there’s gonna be some carnage.
As far as favorites go, for the ladies, with Anneke Beerten in form, it’s likely a battle for second. Look for Melissa Buhl to do well, or Fionn Griffiths, but Intense's Mio Suemasa looked damn fast in qualifying, so it's anyone's guess. For the men, Dan Atherton ripped the course a new one, edging out Brian Lopes by 2 seconds in qualifying today. But then, that’s qualifying, right? Racing’s a different animal. Cedric Gracia had the recovery of the day after casing it bad in qualifiers, but other than that, it looks like Ross Milan of Yeti qualifying 4rth is the big news. How many 4X specialists does Yeti have in their army?
Dan Atherton, cutting as many corners as he can in qualifying first.
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