click to enlarge New Team Kits in time for Sea Otter. No pics from Belgium yet. Adam Craig Reports from World Cup #1 After a busy Sea Otter (sorry for no report last week, things were crazy, I had a solid weekend, finishing seventh overall, Decker was solid for April in 18th overall) and couple days of packing and last minute organizing, I left on Wednesday afternoon for the next seven weeks and first four rounds of the XC World Cup. Frank (Trotter, team manager and mechanic) and I arrived in Europe on Thursday (with all of our luggage) and drove that afternoon to the Ardennes region of eastern Belgium, where the Spa-Francorchamps F1 circuit lays nestled in a beautiful wooded valley. We were greeted with beautiful weat! her (very strange for this time of year) that would hold out against all odds for the entire weekend. I rode over to the course on Friday to check out the scene and course and see what the weekend would hold for us all. It’s always a crapshoot as to whether or not you’re going to get a decent course in Europe, they’re content with gravel and grass most of the time. Spa is, so far, the most technically challenging (read: best) course I’ve raced on in Europe. Lovely black soil laid out on steep, rooty, twisty climbs and descents interspersed with enough gravel road and racetrack to let you drink, eat, and pass some people. No climb was longer that two minutes and no descent longer than a minute, cons! tantly changing. The ground was moist, as it probably rained recently, keeping things slick and interesting, but not stupidly muddy. Overall rating of perfect! (In my extremely biased opinion) World Cup starts are CRAZY! I wish I could explain what it’s like but there’s simply no way. I was second row on the grid, looking at the 1k section of racetrack and wondering how I, and everyone else with a decent callup, was going to hold my position. The answer was, I wasn’t. I thought lining up on the wheels of Christoph Sauser (Siemens Cannondale) and Roel Paulisson (Giant) would help, but I still found myself squeezed into the barriers and hitting the brakes after too little aggression in the first few hundred meters. This trend continued for me as all 180 crazy euros did their best road field sprint impression for the turn into ! the woods. I’m not sure who won the prize, I couldn’t see from well outside the top 50.. We settled into walking/running through the woods on the first descent, waiting for things to open up. Then, as I was lamenting my poor legs on the start and loss of respectable position and ensuing ability to actually race, my bike broke. Bad. I had a very random, very debilitating failure that took a while to actually diagnose because it was so weird. I was able to sort of fix it as waves of crazy euros passed me and limp to the Technical zone in close to last place. After a fairly quick fix I set off in last place. Then, I stopped aga! in at the next zone for another adjustment and called it good. It was time to catch some guys and see how the legs were. As I was struggling with all this, Julian Absalon was blowing the race apart at the front, slowly turning the screws and opening up a solid lead over my euro Giant teammate Roel Paulisson. I was feeling good and passing the back of the pack boys with authority, which is good for morale. I rolled through after a starter and full lap in 122nd position, six minutes down on the leader. Knowing my start position for round two in Madrid depended on getting as far up into the points (top 75) as possible, I put my head down and charged. This was made easier by the fact that I was feeling strong and smooth, coupled with the average euro’s amazing inability to ride their mountain bike in challenging terrain AT ALL, I was able to pass about 20-30 guys per lap for the remainder of the race, always moving forward. The technique was to charge the downhills on the NRS to close gaps and have a good time, use a couple of money passing lines, then make a bunch of passes on the climbs and roads whenever it was possible to get clean track for the next descent and repeat the cycle. It was a really good time, which is weird, because it should have been a frustrating day. I started the last lap in the 50’s and 10:20 down on the leader, still Absalon. I always like the last lap, and I was catching faster guys, so I was going faster too, keeping the t! rend rolling. This approach was enough to bring me up to 43rd, crossing the line 10:06 behind Absalon. Pretty sweet to take time out of the winner on the last lap, at least I know the form is there for the rest of the trip if things go my way. Paulisson, Jean-Christophe Peraud, Christoph Sauser and Thomas Frischknecht rounded out the podium. The only other American in the race was Mike Broderick, he had a proud day in 44th, the last guy I caught. His other half, Mary McConnelaug was seventh in the women’s race, which was won by Marie-Helene Premont, first world cup win for the Quebecxican. A couple of thoughts and comments on the first weekend in Europe in general: First of all, I can’t express how nice it is to have some support while racing on the grand stage, our Team Giant mechanic, Frank Trotter, came over with me and was absolutely invaluable all weekend. Having someone to speak English to and hang out with is nice enough, then when they drive, work on your bike and run the feed and tech zones it’s amazing. The German based Giant Racing Team is also great to have, they have a strong roster of riders along with a vehicle and area in the expo that we can work out of and hang out at, in addition to making hotel reservations and general planning for us struggling Americanos. Second of all, there are a lot of people who like their bike racing in Belgium. Even though Leige-Bastogne-Liege (road world cup) was going on in the same region, there were thousands of spectators at the track, screaming, drinking and eating frites. Overall, it was a nice kickoff to the euro adventure. I’m going to Brugge, Belgium for a few days to stay with Mike VanCleven from Lazer helmets before heading down to Riva del Garda, Italy to meet up with Kelli Emmett to hang out for a week and try my hand at Marathon racing this weekend at Marathon World Cup #2. (it’s only 80k so I hope I can handle it, that’s only as long as the McKenzie River Trail…)