Will one be able to ride the downhill course once the Olympics has finished i wonder?
looks an interesting to me.

Do you mean the world cup in Fort William, there isn’t an Olympic DH event.

The olympic XC course is supposed to be open afterwards, although sound like they’re going to take the difficult bits out.

The fort william course is open all summer.

err, downhill isn’t an Olympic sport, do you mean the cross country course? I think there is a plan to tone it down and open it to the public about a year after

You didn’t really expect anyone to do something dangerous and exciting at the summer Olympics did you?

You didn’t really expect anyone to do something dangerous and exciting at the summer Olympics did you?

DH, dangerous and exciting? sorry i find DH incredibly dull, there might be a bit of danger granted, but it isn’t very fast, certainly not ski speeds. Although to be honest i find all TT’s boring to watch.

If you want cycle sport to look good, you need more than one rider on the course, be it BMX, Kerin, or even a road race.

[video]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bKfDwLyaPuI&feature=youtube_gdata_player[/video]

Yeah, boring!

Don’t get me wrong, I love downhill skiing, but it’s not like their course is three feet wide is it? And they never go into the trees!

Take it you like 4x then? Dual slalom?

to watch they are far better, basically anything where you have riders on the course at the same time makes far better viewing.

So Danny hart’s win in the mud last year was boring?
Each to their own, but the majority of mtb’ers like watching DH.

but the majority of mtb’ers like watching DH.

Do they? yes i know a few but most mtbers i know find watching bike racing boring. Sport is for doing not watching.

i thought the Olympic course was downhill? it certainly looks the part

as for watching downhill,i find it exhilarating myself,i recently watched the Mega Steel City downhill,and am aiming oneself to compete in it next year.

How is dh boring? watching xc isn’t exactly gripping is it?

I love how no one pays him any attention after if crashes.

Where has anyone said otherwise?! I find DH pretty interesting, but I don’t think you can say that most mountain bikers feel the same.

Mrmo – obviously by your comments you don’t ride downhill or never have!
Considering the technical difficulty of the courses they ride believe me they are going as fast as they can.

Question for you – what bike do you ride…..Penny farthing by chance?

Mountainbiking simply does not make a great spectator sport. It always looks slow and dull.

This thread reminds me of a quote by my favourite climber, Andy Kirkpatrick. He said ” climbing is like masturbation, its great fun to do, but no one particularly wants to watch you do it!”

It tickled me 🙂

TJ, make sure you watch Val Di Sole today. Hopefully that’ll alter your opinion a bit

TJ – in your eyes what is a great spectator sport?

Another great quote TJ just like Foxes don’t kill Chickens!

bren2709, i am perfectly aware of how they are riding, but i have to agree with TJ on this, MTB XC or DH is too slow in general, it just doesn’t work as a spectator sport.

To me, you need more than one competitor on the course at the same time so you can see something happen. Take a road race/track kerin/BMX/etc, lots of riders clear ability to see who is doing well etc.

Time trials are dull, be it on road or downhill.

I have watched a few DH races – even to someone interested in it it simply does not make a great spectacle – although DH is better than XC for sure.

A great spectator sport? Something with lots of things to look at and complex tactics going on, speed and excitement, something where you can see the whole thing – for me Rugby union

I have to agree, i would rather watch road racing than mtb’ing but would prbably rather watch track and the big Hoymister power his way past someone at 40mph.

Funny i do like watching the big climbs on the tour, just watch in amazment at the speed they are going up 1 in 5 hills, very humbelling.

Yeah watching rugby union is fantastic, twenty mins or so every game watching fat blokes have a cuddle, fall down and then get up and do it again three or four times before the ref gives up and gives a free kick or whatever it’s called.

I have really enjoyed following the DH World Cups since the webcasting and camera work improved. But I have to say that I prefer to watch 4X. The men’s final world championship run last season was pure drama.

[video]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YJ08P0WfPAY[/video]

Ok then can you explain how the World Cup at Fort William attracts 10k+ spectators for a dull boring sport?

Don’t think you can compare DH to Rugby Union can you!

Ok then can you explain how the World Cup at Fort William attracts 10k+ spectators for a dull boring sport?
10k spectators at the highest level of competition in the sport (other than the World Champs)? roughly the same as Bradford City got in the fourth division of football. not much of a crowd is it?

Ok then can you explain how the World Cup at Fort William attracts 10k+ spectators for a dull boring sport?
10k spectators at the highest level of competition in the sport (other than the World Champs)? roughly the same as Bradford City got in the fourth division of football. not much of a crowd is it?

A better measure would be comparing the number of fans at fort bill compared to the total number of fans available. Downhill is a pretty niche sport compared to football so a 10k crowd is pretty massive.

whatnobeer – Member
Downhill is a pretty niche sport compared to football so a 10k crowd is pretty massive.

Is not that niche as, apparently, the majority of MTBers like watching it 🙄

Sorry – I just don’t get the whole thing about watching sport (of any sort). I’d rather be out doing something myself.

Pretty stupid to compare cycling to the country’s most popular sport.

Parkin Brothers videos on Dirt for the Val Di Sol round at the moment are stunning.

I tried to watch supercross on tv with a mate who was a football superfan and he couldn’t see why anyone would want to watch it, found it mind numbing while I found it thrilling. Turns out people take different things from sport.

I enjoy DH but if you don’t know who anyone is and haven’t got any allegiances it can get a bit repetitive, especially if its a bad course.

But the football analogy doesn’t really work. I wonder how many people would turn out to watch Bradford City if they had to travel 6 hours each way to do it.

even to someone interested in it it simply does not make a great spectacle

Your breath smells strangely of bum.

I’ll be watching as much as I can this afternoon. What I can see on the live stream, I’ll hunt down some highlights / reruns.

on tv… xc is unwatchable, dh is at best repetitive, 4x or bmx can/could be exciting but the sport lacks the depth required. most road racing is dull except the well edited/presented TdF but the cameras and crews have had 30yrs to deliver something ‘watchable’ and the race itself cannot be beat for history/size. Some of the track cycling can be as thrilling as athletics track events….. It will get viewers for the olympics but other than that you have to be interested, or the UK have to be doing very well for the average man on the street to care.

i hope the olympics xc course, can deliver something watchable, but im not holding my breath.

everything changes when you watch an event in situ, i would rather see the repetitive DH than sit by the roadside for two days to see 45secs of peleton go past – each to their own tho eh

Pretty stupid to compare cycling to the country’s most popular sport.
uh uh.

I agree it doesn’t make a good spectator sport- I enjoy it, but only because I love bikes and riding. How many non-cyclists tune into the downhill? How many casual cyclists?

In the flesh it’s very different, because you get the true impression of speed and closeness, and the noise, (and sometimes the ground shaking as they pass…) but the flipside is there’s quite a lot of nothing at all.

More importantly, why are they going to “tone down” the XC course after the olympics? It’s not as if it is soooo hard core that only olympic level riders will be able to manage it is it really ??

(besides, they are going to be doing it as fast as possible on racy bikes, so i’m pretty sure the average 150mm FS AM bike isn’t going to struggle too much?)

After all, you can fall off your bike and hurt yourself anywhere, toning down the course smacks of H&S b*ll*cks to me !

The trouble is, it’s a race course so it’s designed as a wide gravel path with occasional features. Take out the features and you don’t get left with an easier mtb course, you get left with nothing much at all.

But I can see why they would want to remove the hard lines, they’re a pretty big deal for an XC course and also, the difficulty of the route is so inconsistent- you don’t want something that’s 99% easy and 1% hard, it lulls people into a false sense of security/competence.

It does seem stupid to remove the obtacles. On the other hand being the olympic course it will a magnet for the have a go crowd. The same features 5 miles from the visitor centre in Wales would probably be OK as the people reaching it are likely to be more experienced…

Having watceg Graham bell fall off on a “B” line I expect some of it will quite tricky

xc is unwatchable

It’s a matter of opinion surely. Some people find road riding dull. I find cricket as interesting as watching paint drying and can’t stand boxing yet I have close friends who love both. Conversely, I like watching baseball but most people outside the US hate it.

Horses for courses (I find that dull too) innit.