Hello! And welcome to Mont-Sainte Anne watching. Elite Women’s racing starts shortly. In the meantime, some updates from the Juniors that took place before the Red Bull TV coverage…

Junior Women

1. Phoebe Gale: 5:09.223
2. Izabela Yankova: 5:16.084
3. Gracey Hemstreet: 5:16.805

Junior Men

1. Jackson Goldstone: 4:13.766
2. Jordan Williams: 4:17.566
3. Bodhi Kuhn: 4:20.302

So, Jackson has won the overall. Congrats JG!

Junior Women’s title fight goes on to the next round in Val di Sole.

Oh yeah. Qualifying news.

Elite Women

1. Vali Höll: 5:04.032 – WOWSERS. 13 SECS.
2. Monika Hrastnik: 5:17.998
3. Nina Hoffmann: 5:19.624
4. Myriam Nicole: 5:22.463

Elite Men

1. Finn Iles: 4:17.842 – GO ON LAD!
2. Greg Minnaar: 4:21.082
3. Amaury Pierron: 4:22.571
4. Troy Brosnan: 4:22.910
5. Bernard Kerr: 4:24.102 – YES BK!

Which course is the longest in this years circuit?

Conditions looking really bright and glarey. In and out of the trees will be hard on the eyes of the racers. What goggles lens for MSA?

And is that dust we can see? That’ll all reduce the slipperyness but ups the potential snagginess on rocks. Anyhoo. Good that the weather won’t be an undesirable ‘lottery’ factor.

Elie Women’s top 10 now. Parton goes into the hotseat with a nice feet-up run.

Norway’s Millie Johnset on track now. Up a LOT at first split.

@ Mark Allker – I *think* MSA. Ft Bill is almost as long, mind.

Elite Women’s racers going to form; no one in the Hot Seat for very long! TV coverage understandably not able to show the whole track but racers looking impressively in control of things for the lower half of the track. Things hsould get really interesting once we hit the top 5 Elite Women’s qualii names.

Important Q: are you getting used to the look of muillet DH bikes yet? They’re not very nice aesthetically are they?

Farina smashes it, despite the unclip stall. Now we’re into the racers who are just that cut above the pack.

Blewitt (NZ) on track now. Looking a bit stally maybe…

Here we go. Nicole on track…

Nicole up at split 2 by 5 secs. Looking very composed and on it.

And… she punctures. Dang. There goes her day.. possibly her chance of the Overall.

All eyes now back on Vali H. Can Holl keep it rubber side down..?

Anyway. Some racers still to go. Not least Hoffman.

Missed the start of the broadcast, what’s up with Cami?

Edit: She’s injured, RW just answered my question.

Here goes my tip for win today. Hoffman…

Have I cursed it?

Vali, I would say.

57km per hr is not-slow.

Hoffman has the legs and the shoulders to PWN the MSA track.

Hoffman takes the lead. 1.3secs is not much though. Vali should really p*ss it but… DH racing init.

Hrastnik (sp?) on track now. Some big(ger) team should sign her up for 2023. Oodles of potential.

Can you imagine being Vali H now? Does she know how Nicole’s run went? Will it affect how she rides anyway? (she rarely seems to ‘take it easy’!)

The Q: can Vali H get down without ‘incident’? If so, the title is arguably hers for the taking once more (in Val di Sole).

Looking rad on track at the moment. She takes the lead…

And Vali Holl takes the win!

I think that is a very significant result for Vali, in terms of this season and for her future in general.

Impressive. And professional.

And Vali’s post-race interview shades are cool.

And she DID know about Nicole’s puncture run.

119 pts between Holl and Balanche going in to the final round.

Elite Women’s podium:

1. Vali Höll: 4:56.012
2. Nina Hoffmann: 4:59.159
3. Eleonora Farina: 5:00.522
4. Jess Blewitt: 5:11.908
5. Monika Hrastnik: 5:12.210

Now that we’ve seen the track conditions, does it change anything with what we expect to see happen in the Elite Men’s racing? Surely it plays into Amaury P’s hands even more? Is that Kerr’s hopes out of the window? And am I using questions too much in this commentary?

The answer is yes. To one or more of those questions.

(I’m just doing my best to pretend I’m not just overly excited about Finn Iles. Soz.)

What happens at the World Champs in Les Gets (which happens BEFORE the final World Cup round at Val di Sole) shouldn’t be forgotten about. The physical and mental ‘results’ from Les Gets will be a factor in the World Cup overall. They always are.

The late, great Stevie Smith still winning the most important competition: Best Moustache In DH.

Any excuse…

Injury update:
Loris Vergier and Loic Bruni not racing.
Sadface 🙁

Particularly gutted for Bruni as it will probably mean no (4th?!) World Champs chance.

Vergier continues to be the Poulidor* of World Cup DH.

*ask yer roadie Dad

Hot favourite to take today (and the overall) Amaury Pierron AKA cover star of the new issue of Singletrack…

What’s Inside Singletrack Issue 144? Out Today!

Cult favourite Andreas Kolb loving life at the top of the mountain. Good to see.

Also, good ‘tache.

Much as I enjoyed CLaudio’s course previews from days of yore (before his alarming ‘incident’), it’s good to have Eliot Jackson in the commentary booth for the actual racing.

Amaury’s ‘tache? Not so good.

Ireland’s Ronan Dunne in the Hot Seat before the big(ger) players hit the track.

And Cathro on the televised feed! 20th for the Lanky Ben.

One to rewatch, Palazarri’s near-OTB. Yikes! Good save.

Sweden’s Oliver Zwar having something of a breakout year. Keep an eye on him in the off-season team news. What can he do here?

Just one of the reasons why Gwin deserves max respek…

Mind-boggling x 1,000,000

Anyway. Back to 2022. It’s hard to predict whether the racing will get more or less sketchy as the numbers tick by. Safe to say, it’s looking loosey goosey from the riders outside of the top 20 at the mo!

GBR’s Ethan Craik looking tuff AF. And fast. Up by 2 secs at the mo..

(watching Craik, my mind drifts towards next month’s Red Bull Hardline)

Anyhoo. Craik takes the Hot Seat with an impressive run. Would be even faster without the noughties baggy jersey maybe..

Suarez always worth watching. Still quite far behind Craik’s time though.

Ok. What can Greenland do?

Vintage Greenlanding there!

Must be a podium surely.

Go Fishponds!