This weeks world cup was a new venue, in Willengin Germany. It's been a big MTB fest for 8 years, with a big marathon and a large festival area with heaps of product stands. It seemed though that people were much more interested in looking at the latest dh parts then they were watching a world cup race. The organizers too seemed only interested in building a spectacular 4cross course then thinking about twice about how a nice XC or DH course should look. Our course was an embarrassment, with a near vertical climb, followed by a long fireroad climb, then a 1min technical section before roads and easy tracks back to the start finish... not that interesting, and we had to do it 9 times!
The steep climb made the race very tough, but there was a real lack of passing. For the first 3 laps the race was just a long line of riders. I sat around 25th place for the first half, before riders started blowing and I moved upto 16th at one point, finally fading back to 18th at the end. Christoph Sauser pulled off the win, and took over the series lead.. Bui was second.
Once again all the kiwi girls were also racing, Rosarah finishing 23rd, Robin 28th, Sonia 31st, Carrisa 61st, Genevieve 68th.