Lenzerheide DH World Cup: How Was It For You?

I only watched the highlights / pre-recorded things a day late.

Chainsaws – that was specific for Lenzerheide – it was something to do with using petrol – its in a protected area and no petrol was allowed in – apparently even farmers etc have to take their machinery out of the area to fill up.

Found it: https://www.ride.ch/de/news/kein-scherz-weltcup-lenzerheide-verbannt-kettensaegen-vom-streckenrand

Translated below (not by me)

What sounds like a belated April Fool’s joke is actually meant seriously: The chainsaws, which are extremely popular fan utensils in downhill, remain silent at the World Cup in Lenzerheide. The reason is that the race tracks are located in a spring protection zone. After eight years of the World Cup, this decision by the municipality and the canton comes a little late.

The organisers in Lenzerheide announce with regret that no chainsaws are allowed on the entire World Cup site this year. And this despite the fact that such a ban has never been an issue since the first event in 2015. But now there is a new water protection map, according to which parts of the bike park and thus also parts of the race tracks are located in a spring protection zone. Therefore, it is no longer allowed to bring petrol-powered machines onto the site. Trail builders must even refuel construction machines outside the zone. The directive comes from the municipality of Vaz/Obervaz via the canton.

Now the organisers are calling on the fans to get creative in order to cheer on the athletes technically. For example, play the chainsaw sound on a boom box via mobile phone? In any case, taking chainsaws with you is not a good idea, as they will be confiscated at the entrance. At least you get them back when you return.

Surprisingly a lot of content on YouTube, watched on my smart TV, I searched lenzerheide and literally hours of content appeared, I fast forwarded the semis a little and landed on louise Ferguson’s run, the name on the screen was Sian Ahern and the footage seemed to make her look slow so my initial thought was oh no they’ve ballsed this up, overall though its pretty good, some of the footage doesn’t do it justice and CG is no commentator, I love Cedric so hope he improves, it would be better with Warner though, Ric is a bit dull and lacks charisma. Hopefully they don’t clamp down on the YouTube content.

Like many folks, I grew up with Rob and his madcap Freecaster moments, and really miss the excitement and level of irreverence he brought. Even my kids (who don’t care that much about bikes – i know, i have failed!) loved watching DH because of his commentary.  Was genuinely gutted when I heard he wasn’t going to be commentating on DH anymore. Quite enjoyed Claudio too.

Tried watching coverage of EWS, but just didn’t enjoy listening to the commentator. Found Cedric funny, almost as nuts as RW, but a bit harder to understand :D. The few sections with Reece Wilson commenting on items was class, very eloquent, he just always seems to come out with the right comment.

I begrudgingly paid the discount deal for GCN+ as wasn’t sure how else to view. My reasoning was that naively I felt that some of the funding might find its way into the sport. Wouldn’t say the coverage was any better than redbull, if anything it was worse; still massive gaps in the course coverage, but now with comedy “toys r us garden playset” course markers. Also, the lack of some riders gopro race coverage due to whatever legal nonsense is a shame. The redbull time comparison graphic used to be good, gave a useful comparison between riders and sections; maybe something similar will come in.

Nice to see some junior race action. Not sure how the new racing format will fare for riders, perhaps reduces the emphasis on outright wins with good points available from the semis?

It is what it is I guess, but it’s lost a lot of the magic of watching DH for me. There’s always Crankworx and not that long til hardline either I suppose.

It’s just telly at the end of the day though, I should be doing something more productive (riding).

Howie

I’ve got the GCN+ app and likes the coverage but the app is a pile of poo.

Slow and hard to navigate, full of obscure road races that I can’t seem to filter out and the playback is glitchy and jumpy. I’ve sort of got used to it but no other streaming service through my fire stick is like that so I don’t think it’s my wifi.

the big arrow boards along the track

I think they marked the split timing sections

and while I’m here, I really don’t understand why there are so many “Whoop” banners. Whats that all about? Are they just showing potential advertisers where their ad could be placed and how it could be seen?

Whoop is a Fitbit-style fitness tracker that you pay a hefty subscription for.

Their marketing team probably need to take a less minimalist approach to the advertising, based on the comments here.

For a first effort I thought it was a decent attempt from Discovery/GCN+.  They will get better.  RedBull.tv had years to fine tune their coverage.  Yes, Rob Warner was a miss but the commentary wasn’t too bad and the racing was excellent.  I liked the new format as there was simply more riding on TV.

I’ve been a GCN+ subscriber for a while but I’m also into watching the road racing so it makes sense for me.

the big arrow boards along the track

I think they marked the split timing sections

They had taller boards showing where the split timings were, I am on about the smaller ones that just seemed to be littered along the track.

Yeah they do it for the XC as well, one of the elite men was showing 153 as he rode up that ridiculous hill at Nove Mesto at some mad pace.

They are built differently.

Back to DH, listening to a podcast this morning they were saying the average speed for the winning run was 33kph. Madness