Wellington; the land of Goths, Emos, and Munters. For the 4th round of the prestigious North Island Downhill Series the cream of New Zealand’s down hillers missioned it to the capital city. On Friday, Big Ian, Tom Oskam and I fired up the Porsche and drove to Welly. Big Ian wasn’t very happy to be racing as he’d rather have been shopping with someone’s sister. When we arrived we wasted half a tank of gas attempting to find the Long Gully which wasn’t helped when ‘special’ locals pointed us down dead end roads
Saturday Practice started at 11am with a surprisingly large turnout for the fortune they made us cough up for the practice runs. The Auckland boys were here (and hung over)
//Frodo, mavis and Kai ‘recovering’
Tom Holland, Des Curry, all the young pinners from Hawkes bay and believe it or not, World Champion Cameron Cole made it down with his plastic fantastic lahar!
The track was bone dry, the turnaround fast and the track was decent with some nice jumps
Now all this sounds great but the wind was blowing at 110km plus so some of the jumps were very sketchy. The entire top section was a challenge as riders attempted to counteract the wind but all in all the practice day was good with some blistering fast runs being laid down. One dreamy aspect of this round was we all got to stare in awe at the mighty Cameron Cole…He’s a dreamboat. Practice was wrapped up at around 3pm and we all went straight back indoors to hide from the wind. A few of us celebrated Brooke Macdondald’s 15th birthday with a bbq at my coach’s place.
Race day
With a 9am kickoff we were all up semi early to get in much needed practice before the race. The wind was worse than ever but the track was still riding well. By 11am everyone had had at least 3 runs which were enough to get the race underway. In the first run, senior men was wrapped up by a charging Des Curry riding a new turner, followed by Cam Cole and Hadley Boyce. I took race one in the juniors followed by Langfish and Dan Meilink.U17 was a tight class with the new age pinners consisting of Brooke Macdonald, Vaughn Woolhouse and Aari Barret. Vaughno took race one followed closely by Aari and big Ian Thurlow-Daniels.
By race two people wanted revenge and shelter from the wind. Seeding first I laid down a good run on the V tizzle, but was beaten by Langford and Melink on their home track. Pro was again rapped up by Des Curry by 15 seconds, followed by Mike Davis and Cam Cole.U17 was taken by Richard Leacock. By prize giving there were a many confused faces as some of the times read out did not seem possible. I don’t think the timing was up to scratch and many of the results reflected this.
All in all it was a good days racing and we were all treated to a no hander by Landford on the bottom jump… Clips are for girls.
To end on a high(excuse the pun), everyone near Christchurch should check out the new Rock star shop on 287 Selwyn st. Ox will have all the latest guys and girls dh wear, so hurry in the check out nz’s first Dh boutique clothing shop
Eddie Master was proudly brought to you by the letters D, N & Z, the number 1 and his sponsors:
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FINAL RACE REPORT: ROUND UP The details on what happened on the day plus more photos. Still more photos to come...
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Video updates through the week.
4X live at 19.00 GMT to 21.00 GMT on Friday 7th September
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Other World Cup News:
Sam Hill wins Schladming Round for the 3rd time in a row. Tracey Hannah win's the women's. 08.07.2007
Yet again, Sam Hill storms the field to take his 3rd consecutive win on the Schladming Course. Tracey Hannah makes it a double header for Australia, taking out the women's race to win her first World Cup round. After rain earlier in the week perfect weather held out all weekend for an awesome event...
See full report and photos below
First win of the World Cup season for Sam Hill and another Win For Jonnier 24.06.2007
Sam Hill takes out the Men's race in the Final ahead of Greg Minnar and Steve Peat. Sabrina Jonier win's the women's race ahead of Tracy Mosely. Justin Leov in 7th Place - best world cup result for a kiwi so far this season! [READ MORE HERE]
NI SERIES ROUND 1
10.10.2008
Wanganui as per usual had riders amping on practice day with beautiful weather and dry hard conditions, but turned on the waterworks for race day. [+]READ HERE
SOUTHSTAR SHUTTLES SCHOOL HOLIDAY PROGRAMME
04.10.2008
Southstar Shuttles are running all this week (second week of school holidays) in Vegas. Heaps of new trails now running off the top of the service to check out so get down there. [+]READ HERE
Brake Burner 6hr Super D entries now open
01.10.2008
The NZONE the Ultimate Jump Brake Burner 6hr Super D
Entries are now being taken. One of THE events of the season
Race date 7th February. [+]READ HERE
TIA AVAILABLE SHORTLY IN NZ
27.09.2008
NZRide.com is pleased to announce the release of TIA (This is Australia) in New Zealand. The DVD showcases Australias top talent with the likes of Hill, Rennie, Delfs, Graves, Kovarik, Hannah, plus many more and will be available in the next couple of weeks from all good bike stores and through the nzride online store. [+]READ HERE
