Sunday was the 2014 UCI Mountain Bike Marathon World Championships in Pietermaritzburg, South Africa.
Jaroslav Kulhavy (Czech Republic) and Annika Langvad (Denmark) took the titles. The XCM World Championship title is Kulhavy’s first and rounds out his trophy case nicely along with a 2012 Olympic Gold medal and a 2011 World Championship Gold Medal. I imagine it’s also a great way to salvage a season that up to now had been a struggle to comeback from a pre-season injury.
This is Part 2 to yesterday’s already updated blog post where I lamented the lack of media coverage for the 2014 Missoula Pro XCT race. I’m still lamenting, but to show that I am not just sitting around bitching about how our National cross-country race series gets roughly the same media coverage as a community college intramural volleyball match, I am updating that post with some links and a photo I stole from the Sho-Air Cannondale Team Twitter feed (I await contact from their lawyers as I type).
This past weekend was one of my favorite races: The Hilly Billy Roubaix near Morgantown, West Virginia (just about 45 minutes from my old home in Western PA). I’ve done the HBR twice in the past (2010 & 2012) but much as I wanted to head back home and race it again in 2014, it just wasn’t going to happen this year.
I’ve loved the concept of Ultra CX races for years now and have long championed the formant and the series. Some longtime blog readers may even remember the weekly raids I used to make in the mountains of PA where I would mix together 40 to 60 mile loops of forest roads, double track and singletrack that featured more climbing in one ride than I get here in half a season. Sigh, memories…
Like I said, I wasn’t there this year, but much to everyone’s surprise the race happened anyway. It looked like it was a mud fest in parts and as per usual– a damn fine race. Check out winner (and fellow Michigander) Mike Simonson’s blog and his race recap. Nice to see Mike get the win and show folks that Michigan flatlanders can hold their own in the big hills (not me, but at least SOME).
You can find more about the Hilly Billy on the race’s Facebook page.
Round 4 of the USAC Pro XCT happened this past Saturday, but if I wasn’t telling you, you would be hard pressed to know it. It’s now Monday (10:45 a.m. US EST) and there are still no results listed on usacycling.org or coverage on any media outlets.
As of the time of this post the Missoula XC web page DID have the results posted, so below are the top five elite men and women.
This morning as I clickity-click-clacked around the interwebnetsphere, I was reminded (pretty much by accident) that the U.S. has a national cross-country race series: USA Cycling’s Pro Cross Country Tour. A seven race series that is a combination of a few US Cup Pro Series races on the left side of the country, plus a race in the middle and one on the far right.
Once I was reminded of America’s dirty little cycling secret, I got to wondering who was dominating our great nation’s race series. It turns out, not many Americans. Take a look-see…
While Julien Absalon grabs all the headlines of late (deservedly so as he his kicking XC ass all over Europe right now), 38-year-old fellow countryman Miguel Martinez continues to ride along, competing in the UCI XCO series as well as a host of other XC events throughout Europe, including this past weekend’s 3rd round of the Czech Cup in Kutna Hora, Czech Republic where he took the win, sporting what is fast becoming his signature look of Ambervision-like Sunglasses and “say my name, say my name” cycling cap.
Another fine display from Soiled Chamois favorite and UCI XCO Series leader Jolanda Neff (Liv Pro XC) displaying her “Neffness” (my term for Neff’s rad factor), new Giant Liv Lust bike and more skill than I ever had or will have. But then again, I have no idea what she is actually attempting here and if it worked out in the end.
Photo by Susanne Litscher via Jolanda Neff’s Facebook Page.
One of the cool things about having done XXC Magazine is that I was on the media mailing lists for a lot of cool races. Hell, I even used to get invites to races all over the country and the world. Of course it was a bitter pill to swallow knowing that my days of racing or at least successfully completing serious endurance races were behind me, and that with a staff of one at the helm of the magazine and little money in the company safe, there was no world traveling in my future.
If you haven’t seen Epic TV’s five part series Racing The Untamed, Team Bulls at the ABSA Cape Epic, then you’re missing out on some great coverage on some of the top mountain bike racers in the world at one of the most amazing races in the world– The ABSA Cape Epic.
Team Bulls is a German based UCI mountain bike team made up of Germans Karl Platt, Stefan Sahm, Tim Böhme, Simon Stiebjahn and Martin Frey, as well as Thomas Dietsch of France and Urs Huber of Switzerland. If you are into endurance, marathon and stage racing, I recommend following Team Bulls on Facebook and Twitter, they do some of the coolest races in the world and are not shy about sharing photos, videos and recaps to promote their team and the sport of XC, marathon and endurance mountain bike racing.
The first episode is posted below with subsequent episodes linked after. Really great, well produced stuff. Check it out…
This past weekend was the 2014 European Cross Country Championships in St. Wendel Germany. There was no big surprises in the Men’s race as Julien Absalon (France) just keeps on winning whether it’s for team or for his country, this time taking the victory over Swiss rider Fabian Giger by 15 seconds. The Czech Jan Scarnitzl took third.
