April 8/22 13:03 pm - Batty & Smith Will Not Race Brazil; Pete Disera Comments on Course

Posted by Editor on 04/8/22
 

A few more tidbits from the opening round of the XCO World Cup in Petropolis, Brazil, this weekend.

- Emily Batty (Canyon MTB Racing) and Haley Smith (Maxxis Factory Racing) will both skip the first round. Smith will be competing at Sea Otter (this weekend), while Batty starts her season at the US Cup in Fayetteville, Arkansas in two weeks. Both plan on beginning their World Cup seasons at Round 2 in Albstadt, Germany, at the beginning of May.

- We posted our preview yesterday with course remarks from Maghalie Rochette (Specialized-CX Fever) and Jenn Jackson (Canyon MTB Racing). You can see their comments Here. Both commented on the extreme jumps, but now Peter Disera (Norco Factory) has informed us that everything has been toned down for the World Cup from last week's C1 race:

Course here is so rad! The venue is interesting, up a single lane valley road to nowhere (but also to somewhere because it keeps going for 40km). You ride past [Brazilian star] Avancini's cottage on the way into the expo.

For last weekend's C1 the course was unreal. Muddy and sketchy but fast and open and tech. The tech isn't hard, big drops, hucks, jumps and fast fast berms - but the consequence is pretty hit. Lots of commitment required.
Unfortunately for the World Cup they completely dumbed down the course. All of the drops are now rollable, gaps have been filled in, etc. Sad to see, it was one of the most rad courses ever before that.

It's a long meandering climb, some tech, then more climbing before dropping into a fast descent. Should be good, speaks to people who have some punch and can sustain.

It's hot. It's humid. Everything is damp.

- The schedule has been adjusted slightly, due to Brazil's clocks going forward for their winter this weekend. Otherwise, some races would have ended at dusk. So, the XCC [Short Track] was moved up by 30 minutes and the Elite XCOs for Sunday will be bumped up by an hour.