Sliced & Diced: Gwinhog Day at the Windham World Cup

Now we know how Bill Murray felt in Groundhog Day – we wake up every Sunday hoping that things will turn out differently but knowing deep down that we’ll see the same face on top of the podium! At least Aaron Gwin is a deserving winner.

History repeated itself again this weekend as the American took his fourth consecutive World Cup win, and his second on home soil at Windham, New York. That didn’t make the racing any less exciting, though, with some new faces on the podium and a controversial victory for Rachel Atherton in the women’s. Here are the highlights…

Gwindham

Gwin won by less than a second. That means the rest are catching up, right? Er, not exactly – in a post-race interview on Red Bull TV he revealed he’d made a mistake on the top section and had temporarily lost his chain near the bottom. It’s scary to think how fast he’d have been without those slip-ups. Gwin now leads the series by 295 points with two rounds to go.

Aaron Gwin’s a natural born downhill racer. Picture by Steve Behr

New blood

Windham was supposed to be the race when we’d see some new faces on the podium – maybe even on the top step. The pundits said the short course would suit the young guns with plenty of raw talent who lack the consistency and power needed for the longer tracks.

Were they right? Sort of. French junior Loic Bruni grabbed his first podium spot (fifth) with a storming run but wasn’t quite quick enough to knock Danny Hart out of the hot seat. Damien Spagnolo was on fire at the top of the course and looked set for a top result but punctured.

Stevie Smith. Picture by Steve Behr

That left just Stevie Smith, who’s still yet to win a World Cup. He looked incredibly fast through the rocks, gained two seconds on the bottom section and knocked Gee Atherton off the hot seat but it wasn’t enough to hold Gwin at bay.

Rach goes off course

The big story, though, was the women’s race. First we saw the return of Manon Carpenter, who powered to seventh place just four weeks after breaking her collarbone. Then Tracey Hannah put in a storming run that nearly ended in disaster when she cased the last jump, landing heavily and snapping her saddle clean off.

The same jump claimed another high-profile victim in the form of world champion Emmeline Ragot,who crashed hard and had to drag her bike across the line – check out the video below. That seemed to leave the way clear for Rachel Atherton to take the win – she’s unbeaten on this course and was nearly five seconds up at the second split.

Source: VitalMTB

But then she landed a bit squirrely off a jump and ploughed through the tape, losing valuable seconds and placing her at risk of being DQ’d. Her celebrations upon crossing the line were short lived as she awaited a ruling from the UCI commissaires.

In the end, they decided that as Rachel didn’t gain any advantage by going off course, her win would stand – a decision some of her rivals were clearly unhappy with. Atherton now leads the series by 30 points (950 to Ragot’s 920).

Missed the Windham World Cup? You can watch the full replay on ChopMTB’s Facebook page. For an alternative take on things, here’s WynTV’s Windham vid:

Source: WynTV