Wyn Masters (@wyntv6148) joins the show this week to talk all things from the La Thuile Downhill World Cup, from a dominating ride by Nina Hoffman and four wins in a row for Jackson Goldstone to some wild stories from years gone past in Andorra – This one has it all as per usual!
Grab a coffee, put your feet up and relax to the dulcet tones of the OTB Podcast.
Brought to you by:
Maxxis Tyres – New Zealand’s tyre of choice!
To see the full line up from Maxxis, check out www.marleen.co.nz/brands/maxxis.html
Fox Suspension
https://ridefox.com/pages/bike
If you enjoy the OTB Podcast and would like to support, please consider joining us on Patreon and help keep the podcast alive. This isn’t even close to a job for us and is done for your enjoyment! https://www.patreon.com/TheOTBPodcast
Welcome back to the OTV podcast, the original and still the best New Zealand mountain bike podcast brought to you by Maxis Tires and Fox Suspension. The winning combo of both elite men and women this week with the Santa Cruz Syndicate taking a pretty impressive 1-1 in both fields there. There’s been some been some sneaky new tires I’ve seen appearing. Looks like Maxis might have a prototype in the works, but that’s honestly about as far as I know on that one, so I can’t tell you anymore. But, um, looks good. Also, you’ve probably seen that the new Fox Podium inverted fork has been launched to the public and is out there in the wild. Uh, just had one arrive on my doorstep today. So, I’m looking forward to Well, I’ve got it on the bike. Just looking forward to getting it out there and actually going for a ride and and testing that bad boy out. But, man, it looks good. And that’s all that really matters at this stage. Uh, where were we in the weekend? L man, that track looked awesome. and joining us this week, Wood Masters. Thanks for joining us. Yeah, cheers guys. Good to be uh back on the show and straight from Lill off to Andor today. So, yeah, back home for uh one and a half days and then uh we’re straight back into it. Just getting getting it done with the dad life, staying home and and getting that done. I can relate to it. Yeah. Two two nights at home is still two nights at home. Yeah, exactly. Yeah. It’s probably better than sleeping in a shitty hotel room um in the middle of nowhere. I’m sure you’ve done plenty of that in your time. Well, I know you’ve done plenty of that in your time. Yeah. No, we’ve been doing a good job of booking good places at the events this year cuz we don’t have a pit space. So, we just booked the best hotel that’s the closest. Got some more budget for the hotel. Yeah. Rather rather than giving the money to the uh UCI World Series, we just get better hotels. So, um been living pretty well, I think. And um that’s good news. Not too bad. Yeah. How how are you doing pitch then? Uh normally in a garage at the hotel or wherever we can. That’s awesome. So we just wing it really and uh it normally works. But it’s not too bad. It’s you don’t really need a big pit space when you’ve only got a couple people. That’s good as well though cuz if a hotel’s got a chef or like you know a restaurant then you’ve got you got a team chef everywhere you go. Yeah. So, some of them do and some of them don’t. Um, in Lillil, we had a last minute booking because I wasn’t actually going to do Lill and then then I just changed my mind because I couldn’t get an entry for Leo Gang on the uh Federation jersey. They wouldn’t give me one. So, um, they allocate those pretty early for some reason, which is quite mental. Um, surprising for Cycling New Zealand cuz they don’t really do anything quickly normally. Well, actually Cashy, shout out to Cashy. He does all of that and deals with all of the for that as a volunteer. So, um, wow. That’s why it’s getting done. Shout out Cashy for all your efforts making it work. And, um, yeah. Unfortunately, I couldn’t get in for Leo Gang. I was like, I wanted to do Le Gang. Then I was like, oh well, I can’t get in for that. Uh, I’ll do Beldaol and Lwell. And I probably would have rather done Leo Gang than Visaol to be honest. Um, but then Lill was awesome. So yeah, brand new track, super gnarly. It got like Velder Soul after a few runs. Um and it was just yeah, proper race. So was good to get into that one. Before we get too far into it, um you announced your new deal with Focus. The Was that Valdis or was that before Lill? Uh that was in Valdis. I announced the deal. That’s right. Yeah. So that’s uh I imagine that’s a pretty uh natural move between uh a former pawn uh business with GT through to focus. Is that kind of how all obviously all that sort of slipped over? It would seem like but it’s not. So it’s like starting on a new company completely. Um, yeah, they they are gone as well, but it was like first I had to be terminated from the GT contract. Um, which Jason, my previous boss at GT, was pretty good to me and got me some extra months payment, two extra months of payment. So, that helped. Nice. Um, and that got me through to June and then, yes, got a completely new contract and we had to like fully negotiate, do everything again with focus. So, it’s like just starting a new brand completely. Even though we’re in the same group, the only benefit to being in the same group at the moment that uh I can see is that um it’s possible to use the mold from the GT downhill frame because GT’s not going to work anymore as a brand. Yeah. Um, so we can use that GT downhill frame and put not a focus or whatever we want on it and paint it in focuses colors. Sweet. Maybe it’s going to be called the focus Gary. So yeah, I hope so because when they’ve got like Sams and all these names like that, like a Gary just fits perfectly. Yeah, Gary. And um it’ll just be for the riders that ride for them. So that that works good. People are like all like, “Oh, why don’t they have a downhill bike?” I’m like, “Why would they have a downhill bike at this point?” Like, you’ve got they sell so many bikes without having a downhill bike. They’ve got no worries. Yeah, the downhill bike is not the bike you rush to make to sell. So, um yeah, we’ll we’ll keep riding that and yeah, I think that should work well. Then I don’t have to change bikes and I don’t do actually in the grand scheme of things, I don’t do that many downhill races. So, yeah, it’s all good. Yeah. Speaking of downhill races and you doing downhill races, um, how has this season been going for you? Like, you haven’t made a finals yet, but there’s a lot of people that haven’t made finals because holy [ __ ] it’s gnarly. But you’ve been putting in some [ __ ] legit times for the oldest guy out there. Um, how you been how you been feeling? Like, do you still feel competitive? Like, obviously you you’ve still got a lot of speed in in Valdol. Definitely not. Um, I was just surviving. I hadn’t done I haven’t done enough prep to race something like that. So then that was kind of just getting prep for L 12 and then in L 12 it was getting better on the last day like the I need to get to where I was at on the finals day or on the on the Q2 run. I needed to get to there in time training but then to do that so much risk first day of practice. Yeah, that’s gnarly. and and I don’t really risk it like that anymore so much. So, um it’s it’s not going to the reward is not that high. So, um yeah, I’m not risking it like I used to, but um yeah, you kind of have to cuz you got to be up to speed for that first time training session generally and then you can build from that for the weekend. But still feeling like pretty good and I was stoked that I could improve on all my runs. Um I just needed more timed runs really. Yeah. Yeah. And that it it was good. Yeah, I’m not complaining, but um yeah, I look good when Aaron’s not out there. When Aaron comes back out, then uh he’s definitely the fastest dog guy. Yeah, fair. But I mean, that dude’s also the second alltime winningest World Cup uh rider. So, he’s got some pretty serious credentials behind him. Yeah, it’s quite hard to compare to him. Yeah, he um he’s impressive though. like his part-time and he’s still coming out and like just putting it into finals relatively easily. Like he’s still still [ __ ] smashing it. Yeah. To do that um without doing all the races is un unreal cuz there’s guys that are doing all the races and they can’t make a final. So like not really talking about myself because that’s not I’m not I’m not there for that sole reason of racing. I’m like trying to do two other jobs. But um but like there’s a lot of factory riders that are struggling to make finals. So then Aaron just shows up. He has his little program and it runs pretty well with Matteo as the mechanic and um the other mechanic James. I think they’ve got like a good setup. They’ve got what they need. And even the other kid that’s on his program is riding really fast now as well. So, it’s been great to see his progression that Mikey Deal I think is he close to to getting into finals. So, pretty impressive. Yeah, I think I have like I think there was a part of me over the last few years where I was kind of like, man, just just hang it up. Like, it’s not going the way it used to. But now that he’s only racing part-time, I feel more like this is this is awesome, you know? Like he shows up and he’s he’s getting these results still. So, um Yeah. Yeah. Would you say you feel inspired? I am more inspired to race downhill at the moment than I have been in a number of years. I don’t know. This season just has me pretty fired up. Come back. You have to you have to email Cashy to get a Federation jersey. Yeah, I had some messages the other day. Um there’s a there’s a few boys heading over to uh Mast’s Worlds next year and they were sending me dates of when they were going in that. But yeah, I don’t know about don’t know about going that far just yet. Oh, Mast’s Worlds. [ __ ] Yeah, that’s that’s when you’ve acknowledged that you won’t do another World Cup. Well, I think I think already Yeah, I think it’s been 10 No, it’s been probably about 12 years since I last did a World Cup. You should for South Korea next year. That’ll be a good one. There won’t be many riders. It’s going to be about the closest we’ll find one, I think, anytime soon. Yeah. Which is a shame. So, that’s the that’s the rumor of round one, eh? South Korea. That’s what we’re hearing. Yeah. Around end of May, I think in South Korea. You just hope it’s not North Korea. Probably not the easiest place to get to. Yeah. Bit difficult to get through the border. Yeah. Oh, that’ll be an interesting one. At least it’s going kind of global again. That’s pretty cool. Yeah. To me, I I wonder how if they do it fully global, how many teams can afford it? Like, they’ve all got great great setups in Europe and it’s easy cuz you just drive your truck to like they just literally pack up in the twill Sunday night, they drive and they’ll be there this afternoon or even this morning. Um but but um they can’t take much when they got to go to South Korea or a Whistler or wherever they to fly everywhere. It’s pretty difficult and expensive. Yeah. Whistler. Is that is is that a rumor? Is it? I saw the rumor. Yeah. Whistler as well. Yeah. I haven’t seen that, but that’s um that’d be an interesting one. That feels like it’s years in the making. Seems fairly obvious, right? like, you know, it’s it’s a it’s a landmark spot. Imagine a Whistler World Cup with Jackson and Gracie competing for the win, you know? Yeah. Now’s the time. Yeah, pretty much. Do you also think I don’t know to me it feels like Crank Works has lost its shine a bit? Like I think Whistler is probably the only one that really still performs out of all the Crank Works events, but like you know, imagine a World Cup in Whistler. like Whistler would burn that night at the afterparty. It would be insane. Yeah, it’s definitely about time that they do it. And then the crank works used to be so big, like it used to be a huge thing to go and race the crank works downhill. Like everyone would be like, “Oh, you’re going to crank works.” And now it’s not quite got that same vibe about it. And probably Whistler’s like keen to get a world cup now. Yeah. Will be cool. Will be cool if it happens. I’d love to see it. Especially with Jackson in the form that he’s in. That would be good. Yeah. All right. Should we talk talk l? Um man, that track looked good. How was it? Um on bike, it it looked fun. Yeah. Uh pretty much had everything. Had those fast open turns at the top which were kind of scary cuz there was quite a lot of loose rocks in there. It looked like there was lots of little baby heads in there. Yeah. And they’re just moving with every rider. So you you’re going 60 well some people are going 70 km an hour and you’re hitting those leaning on those. It’s pretty scary start but then um yeah then you’re pretty much into steep track for the rest of the way after that. And um it was like quite sick dirt kind of similar to a little bit like the Coronet Peak dirt. Yeah. With that sandy. Yeah. And then you’re just ripping that the rest of the way. And it was quite soft because it’s fresh track, but it didn’t like completely destroy straight away like Vela did. So, if you watch the uh Q2 coverage, uh Carlson referred to it as Duffy. Uh no less than about 80 times. If you watch any of the coverage, he referred to it as Duffy Doo and Duff and Ghoulies. Leveraging those things in there. No, let’s uh let’s not go down the commentary um rabbit hole too soon, otherwise we’ll be here for hours. We’ll we’ll try and stick to the Before we go on, um just quickly want to jump in. Welcome Red Dog to the podcast. He’s been here. He just he just sits quietly. You ever done introduction? What is this? I just sit and take minutes. E taking minutes. I sit and take minutes. Yeah, Red Dog. Good. Good AGM so far, guys. Keep it up. We’ll get to the treasurer’s report soon. Uh Chris, I hope you’ve got the numbers in order. Yep. Yeah, I do. We’re making a loss. Yeah. Disappointing. That’s for sure. Anyway, back on but not unsurprising. Uh yeah. Wait, let’s let’s avoid getting stuck into the commentary at this point. Um maybe that can be a topic for later on. Steepest track ever. Karen, I was going to ask you if you guys knew that it was the steepest track ever cuz no one really told us. Um, other than Rick about 30 times. Is it the steepest track ever though? Because Sean I was just going to ask you when was it? Yeah. Oh, we we were trying to do this calculation, but I was cuz I was like, well, it says I think somewhere it said 680, but other places were saying 641 elevation drop, which is massive cuz we normally never go over 500, so I’ve never heard of 600. Um, but it it has 2.3 km distance and I think Shere has 1.7 and then Champri drops 580. So close. Anyone with quick maths probably Champri is slightly steeper but Sheree definitely did look steeper. You think when if if it rained if it pissed down um would it have been as hard or harder or not as hard as Champri? It would need really a lot of rain for it to get really hard just cuz of that dirt’s pretty good. Just the first grass turns it would be horrible with like all those rocks and it got slippery for some of the riders already in the in the race. Like you saw um Lady Kun just go straight out of the track. Yeah, he was a little bit too aggressive as well, but it was also not as much grip. And you also saw riders like Deprower, they pulling rolloffs already 40 seconds into the track. So it was probably quite wet for some of them. And then maybe they timed that um technical issue perfectly so that the other riders could have a good dry track. I was going to ask about that. Was that a Was that a weather pause? Sven was throwing out some rumors that maybe it was um someone from Santa Cruz just messing with the messing with the signal so the track could dry out for Jackson. That was my theory. Some riders definitely benefited from that technical issue. Um yeah, and other other riders had a rough time because they went down before the technical issue. There was a lot of holdups. Gruin. Yeah, that was probably the longest race ever. I’ve never seen a race with so many crashes that held up the race. Yeah, Ronan’s one was surprising. I was like, jeez, a lot of a lot of red flag time. Yeah, especially as he was like off the side of the track at the time. Like it wasn’t like Yeah, he he walked off the side, you know, they had the they had the chopper up at one point though, right? They were going to be chopping him out. Yeah, the cho the chopper took him out even though they did. Yeah. Oh, wow. Oh, really? They can’t extract from there like by foot, right? I think not. It’s so steep. So, the heli was so busy this week like during the practice day. I was like, “Wow, not another one.” I I don’t know how many people got injured, but it was it was flying around the whole time, you know. Hey, do they do they keep them on is there like standby helicopters at events now? Is that a That one was standby, but I don’t know if they do it at other events. I don’t normally see it parked there, but um there the whole time. Um if you’re ever looking for some um some TV entertainment, there’s a whole TV show about the helicopter um uh rescue team that operates out of Zerat just across the hill from there. Yeah. Um and they like chopper people off the ski resort for like broken wrists and stuff. Like they don’t they don’t they wagon to get the chopper up. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, this is me sitting here, the guy that got helicoped off. I didn’t have anything broken, but that’s all right. It happens. Happens. Um, yeah, it was a it was a wild one. And then, uh, Pinky, Ryan Pinkerin got held up with the red flag from his teammate Ronan and then proceeded to do his rerun and absolutely eat [ __ ] over the bars as well. So, it was a tough day for Tracker. Yeah, not ideal for that team. He blew his hand off and he doesn’t know why. I think I think he probably relaxed on the road gap because that’s the only point in the track. So, literally the only chill point. In my Q1 run, I was like looking at the crowd there cuz it was the only place literally the worst live crowd ever probably really. There was nearly no one. And then they put such at the bottom big finish area that you can’t have anyone close to the riders. So it’s like cuz cuz of that last feature people go on all different lines to try and stop after the finish. It’s such a big finish bowl that literally looks like there is no one there. And um the road gap was like the only place where the crowd was kind of pulling up on on the qualifying day. So I gave him a bit of a look where when I was going down the first run. Nice. And then yeah, didn’t do it on the second run though. I was a bit more focused I think. Yeah. Bit more locked in as the kids say. I probably just just relaxed the hands a little bit on the road gap then goes through those next bumps and then he just hit a route and hand blew off crash. And luckily got up. Yeah, luckily he got up and could ride down and he’ll be all right for this week cuz he’s been one of the riders that one of only three riders that’s gone through every race in Q1. And um yeah, that’s quite something to be in part of that three rider group because uh not easy. It’s seriously impressive feat. Yeah, and probably people wouldn’t expect Ryan Pinkerton to be in that club, you know, coming into No, he’s had some legit results though. He’s got some got some pace on him. Yeah. Surely surely a podium is coming for him. Maybe an Andor if he’s if his body’s not too bad after that crash cuz he loves Andor. So, um yeah, I’d love to see it. The Americans have got some real talent in there now. Like a depth that they haven’t had for so long. Um the uh Jesus, names escaping me. Dylan Maples. Maples has been on fire. Yes. The um the most French accent god for American has the the biggest French accent cuz he’s really he’s in he’s in the French team. So then I got people like dropping comments and then I’m like well this is pretty accurate and hell of an environment for him like yeah just French guys like he has to explain to his mechanic and real French guys as well. Yeah. Like like that’s about as French as it gets. Yeah. Like like your interview with T Orin and your after finals and it’s like he has no idea what you’re talking about. He’s just like smiling and nodding and talking about segments and he was lost. But honestly his his interview in Leil was a large improvement from his interview in Valdisol. So I was like yeah he’s already making improvements which good on him. But whereas before it was Max, Max just used to watch all the vlogs. His brother Max. Ah, yeah. He watch all the vlogs with um French translation and then he he knows English really good and he lost like a lot of the French accent already. So he’s like one of the boys and he likes to hang out with the other guys from different countries whereas Till probably didn’t do the vlogs. He was probably I don’t know. It’s funny that the twins and they were not watching it together. Yeah, but yeah, Max is dialed, so shout out to his English. That’s it’s probably a good good place to start talking about the juniors. Um, yeah, still obviously taking the win. Pretty good win as well with Ace second and then Tyler uh Tyler Wake getting another podium, which is awesome, consistent. He is like just that one small step behind those guys, but then like a step ahead of everyone else. It’s um he’s right there with him and doing like a lot different lines as well. Like he he did a crazy line in the in the steeps. He took this inside line that no one else did. He’s like, “Yeah, we just did it in practice this morning. Seemed all right, so we’ll try it.” That’s so good. That’s the most Kiwi thing. Just like, “Oh, yeah. Seemed all right. Should be should be good.” Yeah. Like he he looks super natural on the bike, Tyler. He’s like just chilling doing gaps everywhere in like style like it looks easy. He makes it look easy. Similar to the Aren brothers as well. He’s um he’s like a blinky. That’s what Blinky was always like. Just smooth, stylish, just looks like they’re cruising but absolutely ripping. No, it’s awesome to see. And uh yeah, he was loving the uh the podium apple juice or grape juice that they had. I think all the riders were super dry after that because of the altitude as well. Yeah, you got pretty smoked. I think you start at 2,100 at the top. So pretty really. Yeah. Yeah. And then descending over 600 in a short time. Like for that steepness of track, it was so fast. like surprisingly fast. Yeah, it was still like about a 40k average or something or 39. Like it was pretty fast. Yeah, it’s crazy how fast it was for how steep it was and how like raw some of the sections were. They’re still going just flat out. Nothing slows anyone down now. It’s crazy how good everyone is and how good all the bikes are. Um no one’s like struggling, you know. Uh two more. Well, actually, oh no, Ollie was just out of the top 10, but Jonty Williamson in sixth, Malik Boat Ride in eighth, and then Ollleie Clark in 12th. So, those those four guys have been solid this year. It’s pretty cool to see. Yeah, real good to see. I think Malik might have even won the time training. So, um I think he’s probably got a big result coming soon as well. Yeah, Malik’s first year, well, Malik and Jonty are both first year junior, which is good. Yeah. So, still got another year in there. Yeah, they they’re really killing it. Yeah, they’ve been the most consistent first year juniors out of anyone as well, which is cool. Mhm. Uh then we had we had four in the junior women’s. It’s just become solid. How about Kate Hastings? She’s just become the the rock of the junior women’s from New Zealand. Like yeah, fourth place was awesome. Bellarin birth Indian sixth and then Ellie with a another big crash eighth. Yeah. Is she injured? She looked like she had a knee strapped up. I think it was taped up. Maybe it tweaked a bit, but she was still walking around looking not too bad. So, um I don’t think it’s a major. But I think um yeah, those junior women are just impressive. It’s unreal how much of a future we’ve got for New Zealand downhill with all of those. When they when they all move up, we’re going to have like a lot of elite riders. It’s been a long time coming. Feels like it’s been a real lull for a long time. Hell of a drought there for a while. Like Yeah. Like you’d only have one rider and now we’ve got like all of the junior field. Like literally we probably have the most riders of the junior field for like for our for our size of country and for for the country. Yeah. Just just for Why Why do you think that is? I think we’ve got all the best places to train and they’ve got the example of riders at the top. So, they had like it was a bunch of riders that could see that it was doable. If you don’t have anyone at the top, then it’s like, “Oh, can we even do this?” and you don’t really believe it. And then we’ve got we’ve had some riders at the top like over the last few years and then it’s kind of they’ve had an example and then they’ve had like all the all these good races and they just keep racing each other and there’s like such a competitive group that then they all push each other to another level which kind of was like us when we were growing up Karen with Cam my brother um everyone like lifted each other So, it’s cool to see and the future’s pretty bright for New Zealand. Do you think Enuro ate downhill’s lunch for a while there in terms of junior development? I do. I reckon probably. Yeah, I think so. I think it’s gone back the other way now. Like I think a lot of people don’t really see a future in racing enduro, so they’re back to like wanting to race downhill. Back to downhill. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Well, even some of the kids that come over to do enduro, they’re like, “Oh, try and sign up for the next downhill cuz he’s not an enduro.” It’s pretty hard balance to do be doing both. Yeah, but just wind just mentioned a lot of names there. KB and a preview for the one of the upcoming podcast. We may need to get Wind back actually. Why is North Island downhill downhills better than South Island downhills? I told you I’ve got a technicality. That’s a preview. That’s a preview. How How do you have a technicality on this? It’s not possible. No, I’m I’m going to win this argument. It doesn’t matter. So, we’ll we’ll have to save this for a um like a a mid-season when the mid-season breaks on, I reckon, because I think it’s going to be everyone against Chris because even I don’t agree and I’m South Island to the core. Also, win’s more of a global citizen anyway, so he he he doesn’t really have a side. Yeah. as a as a moderator. Yeah, I’d say I’m still teranicki hardcore guys, you know. Yes. CHC for life. Yeah, I’ll be on the weekend. Beautiful win. Stunning. What a spot. Hey, uh bigger surprise for you guys. Uh, the fact that Nina won or the fact that Valley still hasn’t won this season. Uh, not winning. Probably the latter. It’s been like she’s she’s right there, but man, she’s just been a a tick off compared to what she has been the last few years. Yeah. Is she a tick off or are the others better now? Like I think she lifted the game like Aaron did a few years ago. Yeah. And she’s like set this example so they all know that they have to deliver like these crazy race runs to win races. And I think she’s lifted the whole sport. It’s a good point. Yeah, very good point. Like this was the most she looked fast. Just didn’t I reckon she even looked a bit baffled e? She was like don’t know. Yeah, but Nina Nina didn’t slow down. So, she her two bottom splits were the same as her top splits. Like, she kept pushing the whole way. And the others were slightly fatigued. If you watch like closely, do you see those two bottom splits? Yeah. They’re losing time just a little bit, but a little bit everywhere and then N just kept pushing the whole way. Cammy went from a podium to fifth on like the last split. Like just went backwards. She went from like second, third consistently in the splits to then just drop back to fifth. Yeah. And that was the best I seen Nina ever ride. She was she was just hammering like that was so fast from her. Yeah. When did um did the track favor like smaller riders? There’s a bit of a chat in the buildup about like like bigger riders were going to have to work way harder to slow the bike down and stuff. I would say it does like it, but then um there’s still like guys or girls like Nina and and L that kind of upset that one. But then Jackson and Loris were the two standouts in the Elite Men. So, um they’re both pretty and I think just trying to slow down is like nearly impossible if you’re heavy. If you come into something a little bit too hot, you can’t just pull up where like Jackson probably could. Jackson like looked like it was not even his best run and he still wins, you know. You’ve probably got 30 kgs on them win. That’s a that’s a big difference when you’re trying to slow down. Yeah, I was locking my front tire on some corners. Um there’s one like highline where he did two gaps before. There’s like this really high line before that and they were holding like the camber to the really off camera. Yeah. And and into that and some runs I was coming too hot and then I the front would be locked up like you can’t slow down. That’s not a good feeling. No. And then he’s like just doing that like floating down, you know, like it makes you feel bad. But then to be honest, Loris was super close. So um good to see how close he was. Like Loris Loris looked tidier and he was just off like it was so close and and it like it wasn’t like Jackson swept the floor or anything. Um yeah, but it’s just you know it’s this fourth one on the trot so it sort of seems like he dominated. Yeah. Yeah, he he was making mistakes as well. Like he made a couple of mistakes in the run. He had to pedal out of one of the corners in the steeper parts which other guys were just like keep keeping their speed and then but he just did like gaps everywhere. He did gaps the whole way down the track. The only thing that he didn’t gap was the one that Maxing gapped and like on the broadcast. He watched it on the broadcast and then tried. He hadn’t even been doing it. No. had never done it and then just pulls up on the in the finals and tries to do it because he’s like there might be time there and then that is so unlike that is so not lo like you can that I reckon that kind of shows where he’s at with his mindset of like [ __ ] I got to do what I can to to beat this kid got to find something your uh your interview with him in the track walk was pretty interesting win revealed a fair bit yeah he does like to um share a Oh, it’s pretty good for the interviews. But um yeah, even after the race, he told me his dad was not happy with it. He’s like, his dad was like, “No, you should have won that. What were you doing?” Well, man, put it in the van. We’re going home. Yeah. He’s like, he’s like, “No, don’t worry. You’re not racing.” Like, “No, don’t worry. I’m used to that.” I’m like, well, that’s probably why you’re so good. If you’ve always got critic critic like that and you know how to take it. If you didn’t know how to take that, imagine you’ve just done risk your life to get third and it wasn’t good. So gnarly. What are you doing? Uh, [ __ ] hell. Was it um was the track scary to race? Yeah, to race for sure. There were like there were parts where you were just froing and loving it. If you’re riding the corners good in those like steep drip dropping like kind of BME corners, it was super fun. It’s kind of like sections of Shampury back in the day cuz it was soft. They’re like good BMS and if you stay inside the really soft stuff then you getting like extra speed out of every one. Um but then there are other parts where you’re just like struggling to slow down and you’re like wa I’m going pretty fast here. So it’s scary. They were like a mix of like super fun and super scary and then like if you could ride like Jackson and clear all those gaps, you’re probably just loving it the whole way. Like you’d be laughing. Like the the one he did before that highline that I mentioned was like something else. He had to like hop from from this deep rut that had holes in it, hop the holes, land into the compression so you don’t get bounced down the compression, and then pull up and triple onto the road. And no one was even close to trying that. Like he said that so dialed. He can like put his bike wherever he wants and do it like with ease. And he’s got 2.3 kilos added to it. So it’s mental. I’ve watched his run like multiple times. And he’s real dynamic on the bike with his lower body. Like he is swinging hips everywhere. Knees are always just making these subtle adjustments. And I reckon that’s a big part of why he can do that stuff because he’s just he’s got this like balance point on the bike dialed where he can just move his weight wherever he needs to and um he just gets traction like everywhere. I noticed this thing, you didn’t see it so much this time, but um some of the earlier races he’s got a pretty unique style, right? like he’s he’s standing up behind the bars and it’s almost like he he like lets his hips and his weight and everything fall inside um rather than kind of counterbalancing or counterweing and it’s like he just lets the bike just find traction eventually. It looks like he’s falling a lot of the time, but he’s super dialed. Yeah. Yeah. I don’t know how you can uh emulate it, but I wish I wish I did. Give it give it a give it a crack with it. My bars would have to be 2 m high to um to look similar. Borrow some off deck. Yeah, I was actually looking at the comparison thing where they compared the heights of the riders versus the handlebar. And actually Daks were a lot lower than Jackson’s versus his height. So mad. Yeah, he’s got a very high setup versus his height. Well, Drake have quite a low stack. I think they do. They are quite low in the front end. Stack Norton. Stack. Uh, man. Loy was on one. It was good to see him right there sniffing at the podium again. Yes, it’s good to see him back. He looks dialed as well. He is either like I don’t know. This season it’s either been like on or it’s been off. Like he’s either like he’s Yeah. right there for a podium or he hasn’t made qualifying like it’s been been so up and down but man that that showed his skill in the weekend. That was a sick run. Yeah, surely a podium’s coming soon on the right track. He didn’t have a great weekend at Lu. He was not happy with it like and when we did an interview after Q2 he was like pretty down on the whole weekend and he was just glad glad to be in the final and I was like well you’ve got one run tomorrow that’s like you can turn the whole weekend around in one run that’s all that counts you know and then he did that so um pretty impressive that he could turn it all around and and he’s kind of got the weight of the team on his shoulders like he’s their their rider now so he has to deliver. I don’t think he’s ever been in that position and then that’s quite a new thing as well. I mean, he’s on a on an a an a team and he’s the lead rider, so that’s a lot of weight on your shoulders. It’s a uh a good good uh round to have a good result at though as well, right? Like that was a that was a track that was, you know, you kind of make a mark if you get a good result there. Yeah, everyone. I didn’t see really anyone that didn’t like the track. So, that was pretty impressive. They did a good really good job to build a track for the first year and it be that good. It was It was way better to watch than Lego Gang. I’ll say that much. Yeah, it actually like the whole track looked like you’re watching like it was impressive the whole way. Yeah. A mate of mine text me on uh Saturday, I think it was after the first day of practice, and he was like, “What a boring track.” And I was like, “What? Hang on.” I was like, “Is this sarcasm?” And uh I’m like, “You reckon?” And he was like, “This looks like a motorway.” And I was like, “Fuck.” I’m like, “What have you what have you watching?” Turns out turns turns out he’d only watched a couple of helmet cam videos of it. And I’m like, well, you can’t take anything away from a helmet cam. While it still looks sick, it doesn’t show you how steep it is and like how loose and but um yeah, he’d watch like he’s on the group chat. On Andy, he’s a local guy. He won’t be listening, so it’s all right. Um but yeah, so we had to have we had to have a bit of a heart over text. I had to explain to him that in in fact it looks like one of the best tracks has been in quite some time. Here’s fact, Sandy. I reckon it did this did the sport justice cuz like when you know when you watch the broadcast and like you watch the women’s race and then the dudes come on and it um it just looks like the first few riders look like they’re in fast forward cuz there’s like quite a significant pace difference this week. It’s like the women are like spraying dirt and like cutting insides. It just looks real dynamic and cool and I reckon it did the did the sport justice. Okay. Yeah, they take it really wide everywhere. So, even if there was BMS, there’s still like places you could inside you could do a range of different things. And even if you compared like all of the top five fastest runs, they’re probably not even riding close to the same line, which is actually sick. But we never see that. Normally, we’re just riding this this like polished hard pack one line that there’s only one fast race line and you you can’t do anything else there. You could cut inside on the turns. You could be Reese Wilson on flats. Like you could do whatever. Like shut up to him for for it cuz he was going well too. Yeah, he was going well. Maybe that’s what he needed. He was he was going inside everywhere. So apparently he had a he had a chat to Sam Hill after his qualifying and Sam was very happy with the flats being represented. So, um, yeah, Sam Prime won this. He would have won this surely. Ah, yeah. Jesus. Yeah, you’d have you’d have to say, but then you’re going back. You have to put everyone on an old bike. So, um, yeah. Yeah. I don’t know if this one was not like being on an old bike with no data or knowledge of anything. Yeah, this is definitely one of those tracks to watch watch it on a like an old downhill bike compared to a new one would be so interesting. Well, they get bucked a lot on the old bike cuz there’s so holes. But it looks a little look a lot more exciting with the old bikes cuz you don’t you’re not as stable. You’re just going to be out of control. The old fashioned bikes. The old the old fashioned bikes as that kid said to me a couple of weeks ago. The old penny far. those old fashioned bikes when I was um I was doing some coaching and with these young guys like 16 or so and um we’re talking about Kurt Lancaster, which shout out to Kurt Lancaster. He’s laid up after he’s done a real mischief to his leg. Um but he uh this young guy goes, “Oh, is that the guy that rides those oldfashioned bikes?” And I’m like, “What are you talking about?” He’s like, “Those oldfashioned downhill bikes?” And I’m like, “What? Like a 26-in one?” He’s like, “Yeah.” I was like, “Oh, man. Oldfashioned is that’s tough to hear. That is bad. Yeah, we’re on vintage now. We’re vintage riders. We’re old as hell. All these kids, they don’t have any idea who the previous legends of the sport were. Like all these kids now, they’re like, “Oh, I think it was Ally was like, “Oh, yeah. I didn’t even know who Steve Pete was.” Like, oh, come on. Careful. Yeah, it’s that guy with that mustache over there. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And then she had to go and watch like a whole bunch. I was like, you have to watch some of these videos cuz like you don’t realize who is your team manager. You know, won’t won’t mdown’s all you need to watch. It’ll bring a tear to your eye and you’ll know everything about him after that. Yeah. And then um Altha didn’t know Fab at all either. So it’s like I’m like you’re in the team. Yeah. You don’t even know. Do your history, guys. Hey, speaking of fab, my favorite part of the whole race was watching his reactions in the finish line. He’s anime. It’s so good. Yeah, I was enjoying it. Was that um Was that Ronan’s girlfriend on the camera? Yeah. God, that must have been a horrible moment for her. And they really hung the camera on her as well. Yeah, they left it on her after there was no there was nothing more to see that Ronin was okay or not, which I understand live broadcast, they have to do that because um it’s like if there’s a bad accident, they don’t want to show the aftermath of the bad accident. So, they cut away straight away. But don’t just leave it on his girlfriend. Like, don’t choose the girlfriend who’s in there going, “Um, [ __ ] I hope he’s okay.” Yeah. which same as all of us who like what actually happened. You could see it in her eyes as soon as they cut away from like him on the ground and then she’s just like yeah what what’s going on here now? Poor girl. But Ronin was on a knife edge the whole run. I’ll be honest like he was editing. Yeah, but that’s just how he is all the time I reckon. Like that’s just what Ronan is. He is on the edge of just exploding. Yeah. Makes him exciting to watch. Surely he can’t keep this approach forever. I don’t think like it’s not sustainable. No, you got to find a balance somewhere. That’s a pretty rough year as well. Started the season with a hell of a knock and then this. Yeah. Yeah. And we don’t know what the injuries are now. He says he’s okay. But um when Ronan says he’s okay, what’s okay? You low light. Yeah. Yeah. It could be anything. It could be anything. I’ve got another bigger surprise question for you guys. Um Jackson wins four in a row or Amory shows up like eight days after surgery and gets 10th. Do Amory. I’m going Amory. [ __ ] hell. What a Has anyone ever done that before? I think Apparently Pety did something once but I remember maybe I think he did was it um the one maybe you were at KB uh we’ve been to a lot leavo you’ve you’ve ridden with various broken bits maybe. Yeah I’ve ridden but not not straight after surgery. I don’t remember anyone ever showing up like a week or two after surgery to do it. Like I remember Fabian showing up with like a separated shoulder in winning worlds, but that was like 6 weeks later or something, you know, it wasn’t 8 days. So after his race run, he had to go back to the truck to change the dressing on his cup. Oh, literally like how how do you survive a whole weekend on that track like that? Like you coming in going I can’t crash. I can’t crash. That’s the worst mindset to ride a track like that. Like and he was definitely riding like that on the first day. He was going like really slow and like maybe one corner fast, slow again, stopping like he built up really slowly and then yeah, then he actually delivered a top 10. It’s mental. That’s incredible. And like you were saying, that’s tough enough to do just not even coming in and like putting pace down from the start. The fact that he built him slow and still pulled a top 10 is just wild. That must be pretty powerful for his mindset as well though, right? like cuz I think um there was an interview I saw where he was talking about wanting to come back and race just mainly so he didn’t feel like he was sort of slipping back um just to kind of keep going like if he can do that like he he must know he can do anything now right yeah it’ll be interesting how it goes in and Pandora now he could probably be back on his normal pace in Pandora because he’s now tested his collarbone well enough that he believes Yeah. And but you can’t take a crash. That’s the problem. So he got through the whole weekend, I think, with no crashes, which is also lucky cuz a lot of people crash this weekend. That’s probably a good thing for him, isn’t it? Cuz he’s he’s pretty wild when he’s when he’s pinned. Yeah. Yeah. But if you did crash on it, you’re probably going to do some damage to your collar bone. Like Yeah. No, you’re either going to bend that plate or you’re going to tear some screws out. Yuck. You You’ve bent a plate. Yeah, I bent the plate in my arm. So, that’s right. That’s horrible. That was the one you did in Nelson, eh, on Kaka cuz they they fixed it and then said it was good enough, but it wasn’t quite good enough. And I was racing already in like a few races. It was just real painful. They’re like, “Yeah, that’s normal. It’ll be painful.” I’m like, “All right, you guys tell me then. Yeah, sweet. I’ll listen.” Then like just racing and for William hit a big hole and it just went Yeah. Oh, you didn’t even crash. The bend was disgusting. It had a bend in it. Just And it just went and then I was in disbelief the whole time. I was like, I can’t believe this has happened. So I just kept racing each week. It’s horrible. I snapped my wrist coming up short on a jump and didn’t crash when I was about 14 or 15. Like I just tried this gap and landed real heavy on the front wheel and I thought I snapped my handlebars. As I rolled out, I looked down and I was still holding on to the bars and my wrist was just like a J just in the middle. Yeah. Yeah, that was a gross. It’s like when you split your testicles open, it Oh, that was a little different. I blew I blew both my feet off the pedals that time and um tore them open on the uh remember like remember before Axis you had to have those things called cables that like actuated your derailer. Whoa. Before I’m familiar. Uh so the bike I was on the bike I was on had those it was classic old like mountain bike and it had those on the top tube. So, it had the like the classic cable guides in the top tube and I went sliding in the top tube and I tore the tore the sack open on one of those as as I slid over it. So, that’s a good clean slice though. That’s uh that’s good. Yeah. Still got a scar there. Probably probably won’t probably won’t show you, but I mean couple of couple of beers maybe. Yeah. One of the my mates did the similar thing on the way to school once. his bike in school and his chain chain came off went straight into the stem and it that was such a classic way the chain would slip off and you just peel the stem on your BMX. Yeah. And then he went into the stem and and the whole sack rolled out like the I lost it. Mine didn’t go that far. It came out on the big cord, you know, and some old lady was like some old people were helping you. They had to hold it like, “Oh my god.” Oh, scene on the way to school. Was that in or was that in Wagani one? Uh, New Plymouth on the way to Highlands Intermediate. That’s amazing, man. Yeah. Dari Day off. Yeah. Holy [ __ ] The day off. The afternoon off second day tomorrow. Yeah. Yeah. Good stuff. Quickly, I’ll quickly jump into our um pink bike downhill fantasy league and uh Cam Cole boss at well part boss at virus brand here in New Zealand has actually offered our listeners up a discount code for the virus website here. Um, and if you use OTB podcast 15, I believe it’ll be a 15% discount having that had that confirmed, but I assume that’ll be what the 15 is and get yourself a nice discount. Just writing that down. So, it’s OTB podcast 15 was it? That’s it. I’m just going to try now podcast 15. Can you give us what the website is while you’re on there, Red Dog? Uh, virusbrand.co.nz, I believe. Perfect. Yeah. Uh so they they sponsor our pink bike fantasy league and uh this week we actually had a tie for first place with um friend of the show Weasel MTB. Shout out to Weasel. What a guy. I’m not familiar with Weasel. Someone by the username of Moons a Balloon. I don’t know who that is. But uh Cam’s actually decided that we’re going to do a three race uh like Dash for Cash. Well, not cash, but dash for um dash for prizes. So, we’re going the next this round and the next two rounds for a uh you know, a bit of a big prize draw. So, we’ll do a couple of giveaways over the rest of I can I can get back in. We can go for like rounds rather than the overall. Yep. Yep. You could go in for some rounds rather than the overall. Yeah. Good. Um that sounds so yeah, jump on the Virus website and use OTBodcast 15 for a discount. It works. The code works by the way. Fantastic. Oh, I just checked that it worked. Okay, I’ve got another question for you guys in regards to watching this race. Is the full 29er downhill bike officially dead? Is it over? I thought that was dead quite a while ago. There’s two riders. It’s both YT, right? Andy and YT. Yeah, yeah, I wasn’t aware that it was dead. I didn’t know that everything was a mullet. It’s going that way until recently, like a few races ago. I’m definitely more invested in um like arrow bars and frame bags and [ __ ] these days though, Red Dog. So, that’s fair enough. Yeah, I am. Yeah. I’m surprised when we’re going downhill. Yeah, it’s true. Yeah. Yeah, I’m surprised that we’re not seeing like the the big guys like Benihawa operating a full 29iner. But then you’d have to have a frame that can take one, right? And that must be half of it is you’d have to have a bike that can have both. Yeah. And still keep the geometry good on both, which probably some don’t. That maybe is one of the reasons why the YT is still 29 because it got developed as a 29 when Aaron wrote it. What does your focus uh Gary do when is that are you able to run either of them or you can run a 29 on the on the focus Gary? Oh yeah. Um but you you stuck to the mullet. I just stuck to that cuz that’s what I always ran. So I didn’t I don’t have enough time to go testing wheel sizes nor do I see any benefit. If Floyd’s got a 275 on the back, then I think that’s the uh it’s got to be good. Yeah. Uh so I’m the the problem I have had is I like to ride an extra large frame from Santa Cruz and the extra-L large V10 is 29 only and all the other sizes are mullet. So yeah. Um, so I’ve actually just ordered a a size large mullet cuz I’m a mullet. I want to give it want to give it another try. So that’s my that’s where I’m heading. Going to try again. Reach sheet set on that one. Well, it’s got a reach set already, so you can adjust it between three positions. It’s probably with a 55 mil stem will be about 5 mil shorter than I’d prefer, but I’ll get used to it. So, should be Does that mean we’re going downhill riding soon, K? I’m going downhill riding tomorrow. Whoa. Where was the text? I’m coaching. You could sign up for it if you want. I might have to put an order in for a focus Gary. I’d like a focus Gary. Gary, I’d like I tell you, I’d like a focus Gary, but because it’s the um the like the the respray job, I’d like it to be done as a harrow. That’d be great. And that blue color 100%. Uh I uh the EDR was on as well. That doesn’t get much attention when downhill racing’s on, but Charlie Murray put another strong result. 05 from from the overall. Man, that was tight. Almost. Did you hear Josh announcing the broadcast Charlie had Yeah, he won it. He said he won it by 005. I I saw that they had two mistakes within the first five riders of the commentary or which five and I was like this is clearly wrong. Like Charlie did not win. And then Rick covers it up at the end by saying actually slow me Lucas won the uh the race last night in the EDR. I tell you what, they had one other one too where I was like this is clearly wrong. Rick did have one call that was completely on the money if somewhat out of the blue where I think it was might have been Dylan Maples on track and um he just commented on the fact that he didn’t like the maples had uh different colored brake levers so he had one that was contribution for that run. I was like thanks Rick he must I agree with broken brake lever or something. Yeah. It’s like Yeah. How do you race it down all like that? Yeah, actually shout out to the EDR was so good with the night stage. Yeah, that night stage actually looked quite cool. I was I was done for Endura 100%. Really? Way bigger crowd. Way bigger crowd for Endura than down. And they did a good job of putting together like a decent course for it as well. I thought like I was watching some of the like clips of it and it looked to begin with like it was just going to be down a ski hill or something but it looked gnarly. That rock garden terrier is like proper track and l hosts ski world cups so they have a lot of knowledge how to run to an event properly. So when they released this idea for the night stage I was like this is going to be a disaster. You’re thinking like couple of lamps in a field and like yeah no crowd nothing like you like the jurors. It was like the final nail in the coffin for enduro. But actually because it was at LWIL, they’ve they’ve really killed it. Like they brought in all these lights. They’ve got proper lights. So it was super bright. Like there’s no there’s nowhere where it was dark. You’re not allowed to run a light yourself. So it was like Oh, you weren’t. Yeah. It’s a proper like It was so bright. Yeah. We’ve had lots of you had this discussion. We brought this, you’ve brought this up for that you wanted to see a nightstage, but is this what you had in mind or were you thinking dudes with like big hella spotlights on their helmets and that sort of thing? Well, I must admit they executed it better than I had in mind. Um, but I still would like to see a nightstage where guys have got like night lights, but the rule is you can have any nightlight setup you want. So, no restrictions on nightlight setups. Um, but all I want to see is that people are doing like, you know, um, the transition stages, they’ve got the little covers on the nightlights. So, like little hella nightlights. That’s all. I don’t want that. So, those little plastic covers. Yeah. You know, like in Rally how they had the light pods on the front of the cars just like that. Everyone loves a night stage. Those lights actually looked real good. Like the kind of 360°ree lights they used. There was not really didn’t look like there was any shadow issues or anything. It was so bright. Like um if you stayed up there too long, you probably would have been awake all night cuz it was just like that super bright, you know? And then there’s heaps of people partying next to the stage like next right next to the track like they boop b. And then like drunk people just we went ebiking after the Q2. So me, Angus, and our mechanic, we went ebiking till like 9:15. We rolled straight to the night stage. We pull up there. like there’s two drunk guys like hey we’re drink this I’m like no way am I drinking that you guys you guys are and then there was like there’s just people partying like loving it and that’s that’s what they need at the World Cups cuz we don’t have any atmosphere otherwise when we don’t have like the something happening in the night you know and there needs to be more more of a reason for people to show up like and I’ve said this before and I’ve been lambasted for it like downhill racing is going the way of ski racing because ski racing they know how to run a big public event like that or enduro as well but there’s no snow anymore so they need something to do in the summertime and all these ski resorts are perfect for it yeah but they need to host like more of a festival vibe for the events so I think Baldisol had the forcross and here we had the uh night stage in Jura if we can keep these night night events going it’s sick for the But none of the people hang around for the downhill the next day because there’s no accommodation in Lwood. Like it all literally the whole town would be sold out. It’s tiny. So yeah, it’s real small. Yeah. Yeah. And then it’s a bit of a mission to get to. So way down in the valley. Did you race the Zatro when it was on couple years ago win? Yeah. Yeah. Would you do you reckon Zumat would be a good spot for a a full downhill and enduro? Yeah. could easily do the same. They’ll have more accommodation in Zerat probably, but it’s just annoying because you’re not normally allowed to drive a car in Zerat. So, you have to use those electric taxis to get to your accommodation. Yeah. Um, shout out to Warner Brothers for [ __ ] up the junior coverage for the second weekend in a row as well. That was real awesome. Just hanging out waiting to see that. And then like 10 minutes before junior finals start, they say they put out a post saying there’s a new home for junior racing and that you’ll find it on all their paid services. Uh it was not on the mountain bike world series one that we have in New Zealand. So yeah, missed all of that. They also turned their comments off when they put that post out. So they had no comments open on that one. So they knew that the um hell was going to be unleashed. [ __ ] chest continually. I’m really not sure who does PR for them because they’re doing a really bad job. Like it can’t be that difficult. Just give some people some knowledge, you know? Like tell them what’s going to happen. I think they’re too big to care, man. Like it’s like it’s such a [ __ ] big organization and they haven’t and the sport’s too small for them to prioritize it, you know? like you wouldn’t get that with rugby or whatever else, you know, with cuz it’s also part of Eurosport or something, isn’t it? But it’s it’s you got to imagine they just go, “Ah, details.” Yeah, we’ve got their money now. And who cares if we don’t put who cares if we don’t put the Junior Racing free on YouTube? Doesn’t bother us. [ __ ] hell, stupid. Yeah, it was real disappointing as well. They don’t cover that. So why do they have full coverage of Q2? They don’t do full coverage. It’s like every third rider. But um Right. It’s because it’s the exciting one of who’s going to make the final. I think it’s more exciting than Q1. Like Q1 is all your top riders that normally should go through and then Q2 is like a dog fight for the remaining 10. Yeah, it’s real scrappy. But then they just missed that like they just didn’t show Henry keeper’s run at all. Yeah. And like because they only show 30 seconds. They’ve got 30 second intervals. So they’ve got the option to show 30 seconds of every rider or a whole run of every third rider or fourth rider. Yeah. Yeah. M like remember um like the first year that they changed from Red Bull and you had the option to just turn the commentary off and you could just have the the ambient noise like all the crowd noise. Man, I wish they’d bring that back at the moment. I’m just I was watching I mean I watched it with the commentary on and then I watched quite a few runs again uh later that day. But I just turned it off like I watched Jackson’s Run about five times because it was just there was lots of interesting stuff to watch and I was just like I’m just I’m putting it on mute now. I just couldn’t couldn’t listen to it anymore. There was a great bit of um of public service information that came out um halfway through the finals um something to the effect of uh so the um the pig things the pink things that you see in the track there. actually rocks that have been spray painted just so riders know. [ __ ] heard that. No way. Oh, thanks guys. Good to know. That was Carlson. Carlson laying down that gem of Yeah, those just so people just so the riders can see the rocks. So good. Unreal. Like even if you’d never watched Downhill before, you turn be like they’ve clearly spray painted some rocks pink. Anyone could tell that. Normally, um go ahead. Please let please let please let Nico talk a bit more. Yeah, Nico was good this week actually. Um there was one point where Rick tried to talk over him in classic fashion about something nonsense and Nico just kept talking and I was like yes like he was standing up and he just he just kept going and then Rick backed out and stopped talking in the end. I was like good on you. This is what you need to do. Like get your point out and [ __ ] stick to it. I I quite enjoyed Nico’s commentary during um Gwyn’s run because he pretty much was just talking about when Gwyn was at his peak just talking about the old days. Eko is good, but they need to be and they’re better at it now. Be conscious they need to like throw to him cuz he can’t he he can’t really start talking on his own. I don’t reckon it’s too hard to get in between the other guys. So, they need to like consciously throw to them. I think it was better this week actually. They were really quite good at that. I think it sounded as though he had a section of the track that he would always do a segment in. A bit where it was a corner, it came out of a lift and they drop off some rocks um kind of on a ledge somewhere and can’t it was someone went out the front door there. Um, but he sort of had this section that he would always talk there and he’d always wrap it up at the same spot and it it was sounded quite pre-prepared. Yeah, I put up a um a World Cup bingo uh story on the on the OTB Instagram stories. I think it was after I was watching the Q2 coverage. is things like uh Rick talks over Josh, Josh talks over Rick, both talk over Nico, Rick calls someone a player manager, which definitely is that definitely came out. Yeah, player manager definitely happened. The amount of replies I got and just like people like people involved in the sport too replying and being like, “This is ridiculous. This has got to change.” Like I was like, “Wow, there’s actually there’s actually some people here that I was like, “Holy [ __ ] I didn’t expect to see replies from.” I was quite impressed. Oh, that’s rough. It’s a tall order, though. Like they’re doing a good job with like I’ve never done it before as a team. I wouldn’t want to be a commentator. [ __ ] It’s got to be hard hard work, but still. I reckon you could go back and do the exact same thing with Rob. I don’t think anyone I don’t think you can say anyone who’s done it super dialed Rob brings a lot of energy to those things and then that’s exciting for for for us to watch and you’re like getting into it. He did. Yeah. It’s kind of his brand. He’s very proper he had proper knowledge too. Like he knew what he was talking about. He there’s a good interview with him. do a commentary thing soon. Like a course with Rob? Uh with Rob? Yeah, I’ve got to do some a Red Bull Urban Race, so we had to do a test. Oh, awesome. Commentary test. Uh yeah. Is this an announcement? Uh it not quite, but it’s not quite the press release, but it might be the OTB uh press release. Sounds like a scoop or the Red Bull uh Genovic. Congrats. That’s huge. I heard it here, guys. Yeah, we had to do I was going to say when um listening to to the track Walk, um you sounded like you’d been you’ve been working on on your your commentary style a little bit. Really? Yeah. You sound real tired. Real clip. Oh, I’m not sure. Probably I was less tired than normal. That’s all them. more focused. Yeah, it’s my new bike sponsor that have really um given me a new new found focus. Real lease on life. Yeah, but um no, I did a commentary test with Rob and he had to fly to Salsburg to do it just to see if I could do this. So, we had to commentate on two races. Um, one being Genova last year which I was racing and Rob posted a video on his Instagram of meating. Yeah, mainly it was Rob joking about me but um yeah, was quite funny. And then we had to do another event. Yeah, which is kind of weird and also in the past event is quite hard. So, um yeah, I didn’t quite commentate too much on my run. It was more Rob just making jokes about me, but it was I was the second rider. So, they were more interested in like the last 10, but we had to do 16 riders of that race. And then we had to do another race which was Val Pareso in 2023 maybe. And there was a 20minut injury delay. So, we Yeah. And then do the final for that one. Yeah. That was chosen on purpose to see how you’d like go through that break. Yeah. get to see what how me and Rob work together and yeah and then Rob was actually really easy to work with he like leads the whole thing so well like um if if you’re struggling with something then he’ll just he will fill the air time you know like it’s no problem um that’s that’s a lot like KB on the podcast um like you know we can fill an hour and a half of of dead time yeah we we’ll find stuff to talk about I think that’s honestly for me one of things that I struggle with now with Rick and Josh Carlson is they just both of them it feels like they’re both trying to be number one and they’re both fighting each other for talking whereas Rob was like he was the playby-play guy and as much as I hated Cladio Claudia was kind of just like the hype man that he would throw um you know kind of analysis to um it worked a lot better. Three’s too many is my opinion. That doesn’t need to be three of them. Oh, especially when they throw another person in throw Ken Roxson in the mix and then it’s just it’s classic. Now they throw Nico out when they bought Ken Roxson in. Yeah. Yeah. True. But I find I find there’s a lack of knowledge of downhill like indepth knowledge to to truly explain what’s going on rather than just talk about Pink Rocks, you know? Like I’m a core fan though. I don’t want to hear about pink rocks or 200 m of travel like um honestly I don’t think many noncore fans are just rushing to sign off for down oh not paid that’s that’s real confusing about it right like the sport’s not at a point where they need like no sport people who aren’t actually fans watch the whole thing like people drive to survive but don’t watch the actual race so then the commentators know how to talk about racing. Maybe in the US watch rugby they don’t explain the rules every time. They don’t tell you where that white line on the ground is. I wish they would cuz I don’t know any of them and then then they tell you the goalpost they’ve actually got a kick between it like Yeah. Like they don’t tell. You got to assume the viewer is educated some a little bit. Yeah. But Supercross Supercross does a relatively good job of sometimes explaining things, sometimes a little bit too much. But they do explain things to an uneducated viewer and the core fan without going like too mad. It was the days of the the red the red Hondas and the green Kawasaki and orange KTMs. But yeah, it does it is surprising that they haven’t consistently been able to pull in like exraers who are like Rob who is now a professional commentator. Um but he probably had a bigger career being a commentator than a downhill racer. But, you know, that’s how it works in pretty much every other sport is the top commentators are ex aathletes or whatever else. Yeah. And we’ve got one guy that used to do enduro and another guy that used to commentate enduro. We don’t have Eva as racist, you know, like and if you didn’t if you didn’t weren’t there for the years of downhill, you don’t have the knowledge of the riders or the bikes or the tracks or anything like if you pull out knowledge that’s not correct. It looks pretty bad, I think. Like, of course, you’re going to make mistakes because live commentary is really hard. It’s never going to be easy, but it’s also, but you need to be on point. It’s also a missed opportunity because they’re going to so many tracks now that actually do have a bit of a legacy. Like, we were talking about this the other weekend and kind of taking the piss out of it, but they were at Valol and they didn’t talk at all about how much amazing shit’s happened at Valdol over the years, but they could be. You know, that’s so much to fill the air with. Yeah. Especially if you’ve got like Luke Myers Smith coming down, you can mention Sam Hill. Fellow Australian rider actually dominated on this course. Yeah, you’ve got some something to to speak about rather than Pink Rocks and 200 m of travel. Like talk about the time man crashed and swapped out and snapped his frame in half right before finals. Like there was some wild [ __ ] that’s going on at Valdisol that just gets doesn’t even thought about like and all that builds the event to be like the classic like if you win Visa Soul you’re a legend sort of thing you know even even this weekend like for anyone who’s been watching the sport for a long time the first thing that comes to mind is oh this track’s like champry oh shampere was amazing like there’s so much to talk about that they just don’t they just skim over it they don’t touch it at all But I do imagine they do get directed to talk about certain things, but I’m not sure how the track is. Yeah. Not sure the directors have enough knowledge of the sport and they all think that they’re getting this new audience, which I do not believe is happening. They all like, yeah, we got the new audience. The core audience is not important. The core, that’s the thing. The core audience is always important because in every sport, the top of the sport, the fans are what make it like amazing, you know, like it doesn’t matter what sport is, F1, ski racing, [ __ ] rugby. Like rugby heads are what make rugby rugby. The only people that are watching a threehour live downhill broadcast are enthusiasts. Mhm. There’s there is not I would put money on there is probably not a single person watching it that doesn’t ride a bike who’s just like, “Yeah, I love watching this sport.” Like you’ve you’ve got to live it. Like it’s pretty much part of your personality when you’re a mountain bike enthusiast. Like it’s a bit of an it’s a bit of an obsession, you know? Like it’s not just like the sort of thing where you know like you watch F1 because you’re interested, you know, you think like this is pretty cool car racing and there’s some interesting story lines. Like I don’t know. Mountain biking just doesn’t have that. No, it it can get there, but it needs to be like it’s it’s not about making like dumbing down the sport and making it more accessible. It’s about making it better, just more interesting and more exciting. Um, and I think, you know, I want to see the KB commentary test. Well, maybe we should pull out that live com that that live commentary that we keep talking about doing ourh alternative commentary for one of the North American rounds. We should get on our uh what is it? Black Placid. Yeah, I think so. We’ll get it done. I’d rather see KB do an urban downhill in like a third world country. I can I can arrange the invite. All right, Red Dog. Get that invite sorted. Awesome way. 100%. I would love that. Will it be all expenses paid? Uh, the hotel’s covered. You got hotel dinner. You just have to get yourself that. Oh, yeah. Oh, you might still be a hard one to a hard one to put across the line with my wife. I think I’ll start a GoFundMe right now. You should give your pass for that one. Actually, Chris, remember the GoFundMe I talked about last week? This is actually a great segue. Um, so the rumors have been that Red Dog has his trail bike up sale. Can you believe this? He’s just he’s done with any type of like he’s just a bike packer now. And I said to Chris I said to Chris the other day I was like I might start a crowdfunding campaign through the podcast where we’re actually going to um put together the GoFundMe and we’ll buy Red Dog’s bike, but we’re going to buy it and then we’re actually going to leave it in his garage so he still has to have it at his house. Oh, I thought we were going to raffle it off. No, no, no. wrap it off. That’d be good. If he ever wants to use it, he’s got to rent it off us. Yeah, it’s going to be locked to the wall and only we’ve got the code. And also, as a personal protest to Red Dog Sailing Traers, I’m going to I’m going to sell my gravel bike. Good move. Yeah. I don’t want to do what I’ve done. Um, don’t worry. It’s still here. Last one to just bring up in the commentary while I’m there. There was a lot of talk about how, you know, no no one’s won more than four races, but Rachel Affinan did win 14 in a row. So 14 in a row. Was it that many? Shout out. Yeah. Yeah, that’s amazing. It It started in like 2016 and then I think she won all of 2017 or something or whatever it was. She cuz she had a perfect season in 2016 maybe. And she went she went from like the back end of one season winning like four races and then won something like seven and then won like another three or whatever it was. Are any of the Athens going to like are they attending the races as like team owners and stuff? No, they haven’t been at the last few. So J came to Leo Gangner. He was there. It’s kind of interesting. I thought they would still be like there. Yeah, they’re I think they’re pretty busy with the bike park. Like G and Dan, they’re like swinging off chainsaws every day. Like Dan, especially Dan still lives in the caravan on the bike park. Like Yeah, he lives in a caravan at the bike park. He’s like full trail builder guy. And that bike park is Dan Efford and like without him that that’s not a thing, you know? That’s unreal. Amazing. Yeah. And then like they’ll have like a storm and you’ll just see G’s story. He’s like swinging off a chainsaw. He’s cut his hand. He’s like I’m like these guys are next level. Like and G is still training like he’s going to race, you know? Like he trains properly in the gym all every day. Like he’s training like under proper coaching everything still. That’s just That dude’s such a beast, man. This would have been CG on. [ __ ] That would have been good. Yeah. But and then Rachel’s just busy with mom life, I think, as well. And then she still rides at the bike park quite a bit. So she’d still be super fast. She could probably still just show up if she wanted to, but she doesn’t want to anymore. And the risk is too high. Like what does she benefit from now? Like what is she going to gain from that, you know? Like no. No. In the best case, she gets on the podium and then Mike drops. She should have mic dropped when she won the other race that like just drop the mic. That would have been the best. But I mean, even that was that was so sick that she came back even if she did do a couple more races or whatever after it. But the fact she could put a win down like that is incredible. She’s she’s all time like one of the best without a doubt. You know, like that’s what that’s the thing, right? So like none of the commentary, no one’s talking about like people who have retired in the last couple of years but had such a massive impact on the sport. That’s the depth that’s not there. Yeah. And um even at Sea this year, Rachel was on like a trail bike, like quite a big one. They’ve got a 170 travel I think. I think it’s alloy too, so it’s like not a light bite for the downhill there. And she had the big downhill tires on like super soft compound. Everyone’s got like cross country tires, light bike, like perfect setup for SE. She’s still second and the woman like hell amazing. Wow. She she is mental. Like she’s still good, you know? But class is always class and it never really is lost, you know? Like even with Greg, you see how well Greg’s doing the job in the team now. Like I’m pretty impressed. how much his knowledge is transferring to the riders. And then our last shout out, we got to shout out Eris for being back in the final. And then Yeah. Yeah. She got 11th, but you no one’s seen the journey she’s been on this year just to even be at that race. Yeah. And then another I can’t believe she’s even got there at this point, you know? Like I thought she was out for the year. Yeah. So shout out to her and I think her her time will come. She’s in the right team. like you look how Gracie’s improved in that team. If Aris can like just, you know, like ride the coattails a little bit, she’s going to be there. You know, like it just she’s she’s had no offse, no training, and she’s weak. So, if she can still get 11th and or qualify seventh as well out of Q1, then that’s amazing. Like, she can do a lot when she actually gets the right buildup probably for next season now. But she’ll keep building through this season. And it’s just hard if you don’t don’t have that offseason base. Yeah, it’s good to see um Jess being pretty consistently like right in the top 10 as well. I feel like she’s one of those ones that hasn’t had a consistent season for so long. And um yeah, she’s she’s staying pretty solid. So hopefully like I reckon if she makes it through this season, has a good off season, like both her and Eeris will be super solid next year. Yeah. Well, if we look last year, like Eris, I think had a faster time at the World Champs than than Bali did. So, if she can get back to strength and then Jess should be able to win a race as well. So, like Jess has been last year won qualifying in Bel and then crashed before the race, but now she’s a little bit more like wise in her riding. Like she she had a crash I think in the tour on the finals day morning. So then she was like, I’ll just ride to a solid result rather than go all out and have a crash. And then that’s a lot smarter to do that every race, then just go from the biggest high to the biggest low. Yeah. Yeah. It’s crazy that we’re five rounds like we’re only at the halfway point through the season. It feels like it should be just about be like coming to a close. So it’s pretty cool. There’s still another five to go. Yeah, it’s a long long season. So, um, big big gap coming. Yeah, summer break. We’ve got the summer holiday coming up. Yeah, summer holidays. Just go and follow the tour for a couple of weeks and that’s good. That’ll keep keep plenty of watching going on. Yeah. Uh, are you doing any of the anything in like Lake Placid or uh Monsan or you going to give those a miss? I’ll probably like at the moment I’m thinking I might do Lake Placid and and US Open but maybe not Monsedan because I’ve done that so many times but and it hasn’t changed. You’re still riding over the same rocks. Yeah. So like Lake Plac’s cool cuz it’s fresh track. Um and racing in the US is always really good for the crowd. So probably probably do that. Um me and Red Dog have both raced at Lake Placid. You didn’t ask but we’ll tell you. 2009. We raced when it was a five a 5k long track. The white face 5k bikes 5k. It was huge. Big prize. It was probably like a 10. Was it It was about 10 minutes. Yeah, it was like just under nine or something. It was big. Yeah. I’d um I’d really like to see a return to um to like old school US um like California super dry. Yeah. Big mammoth. Yeah. Sponsored by Mountain Dew and Chevy trucks. I feel like that’s that’s the one thing that’s kind of missing at the moment because you’ve got the European Alps, you got, you know, the East Coast, the US is what it is, but you don’t have the big like American ski resort vibe. What’s the mountain range in South Korea next year? Is that like an infamous mountain range or I think it’s a ski resort. Um, so the the Instagram account Toolbox Wars, which is like all the uh mechanics toolbox, I think the guy is based in South Korea, so he was messaging me a bit. Ah, yeah. Yeah. And he said he was worried about how what people think of the accommodation cuz apparently it’s all owned by um run by like some one business or something and it’s Yeah. So, we’ll see. But I said I said it can’t be that bad. I said there’s plenty of countries in Asia where it would be worse or like you’d think it’ll be worse, but I think people just need to we need to travel more. That’s if they’re going to call it the World Cup, it should be the World Cup. But then I do wonder how many teams are going to actually afford to do this massive World Cup. Have six riders. It used to go to It used to go to Brazil, used to go to Japan. like we’ve had Australia it should go that’s I don’t know they’ll just have to work out their budgets and maybe not take as many staff or something like the flyway rounds might just be different to you know how they’re set up in Europe you won’t have 10 people on track yeah it’s a I mean the the big brands must be seeing the opportunity just for exposure in different market as well though right you there’s so much in South America these is presumably all the brands see that as a as a big emerging market like I imagine the Specialized and Giant or the rest of them they’ll see that as being yeah more eyeballs that don’t normally see this stuff. Yeah. The um is it the Colombians? Colombians have been pretty legit in finals recently between um they’re so good. Yeah. Like who saw that coming? So yeah, South America like that’s there should go should be more racing for these guys. Those guys are products of the street racing too. Like that’s literally the only pathway for them to get here. So wild. That’s so sick that they’re so established. Yeah. Yeah. But that’s not going to be a thing anymore when they get it like make it more and more elite for the World Cup. Like that you won’t be able to come in and try your luck at the start. But they’ve been lucky enough to get on teams from doing those street races really. You got Sebastian Hogan and one for valleys and one for I think he can he can get on the World Cup podium this year if he can ride his speed for a whole run at the moment. He’s riding like sections of track faster than anyone. He’s just out of control. You need to have a look on the actual video of him trying to do on one section on finals morning and he is coming in with a lot of commitment and uh a little bit out of control and it’s pretty sick to watch like he rides like that all the time. So um yeah, he’s he’s definitely coming. I think he’s probably going to win a race at some point in his career just for his all out raw speed is better than most people and that’s the hardest thing to get. You never you don’t gain that from training or anything? No. Do you think as much pain says we can work with speed? Do you think the World Cup will ever go and race a uh a street race? Oh, I mentioned Deote like when you come into the street racing he hates it but it would be the best thing ever if the World Cup like that would be growing the sport in my mind like yeah some people hate it but then it’s suddenly in front of all these people like the original in Lisbon but if they Lisbon had everyone show up like eight times yeah and it were It’s a World Cup. We’re going to go all out and build like an epic track. Like they they could make something that would be amazing. It would still be dangerous, but who says the 12 or below is safe? No one. So So yeah, that’s that’s the one thing I say to people is like they’re all like, “Oh, the urban race is so dangerous.” I’m like, “Yeah, but the ground doesn’t train change it at all.” So like you’re riding on the same ground the whole time. Like you know what’s there. Like when’s the World Cup? You come down your final run. There can be a rock there or the rut’s gone. So you crashed. That rock that Ronan crashed into and in Tasmania looked like pretty hard. [ __ ] Yeah, that wasn’t soft. No. No. Oh yeah, I could be down with seeing like at a ski resort, you know, you you get those ones that are right up on the mountains and sometimes a ski run will go down past it as well. Like, you know, part part trail at the top with a bit of urban section through the ski resort and then down into some more um you know, off-road trail again. That could be pretty cool. Yeah. Or just finish on the urban section into the village, you know, like that would be sick. And then then you don’t need the people to go up on the mountain like cuz the uninvested fan is not going to hike up on the mountain to watch mountain bikes ride down. No. No. Yeah. This I mean that’s again going back to the skiing thing. That’s how it works with a lot of the the big downhill um like the the downhill racing um and skiing where they go like there are lodges and bars and things all the way up the side of the pie and there’s people hanging out at nighttime watching that [ __ ] and the whole village is out and it’s 5 and it’s party. It’s like a big party. That’s how it should be. more pleas. All right, let’s wrap things up. Um, who’s going to win Andor men’s and women’s? What do we got? Oh, you’re going five in a row, you reckon? Lower. Yeah, he wins out. He wins out. Six more rounds. He wins out. I’m going for L. Yeah. Yeah, I’ve got Lo. Mike was going to win the World Champs last year and he crashed and he’s surely wants to win one in Andor especially. He doesn’t want to win. Be so hungry. Yeah. Yeah. He’s never wanted to win more maybe. Yeah. But it also be nice for him to get one over all the, you know, common cells home as well. Yeah. His his home too. He lives there. So Yeah. True. Yeah. Uh, I’ I’d like to see Jackson go five in a row purely just because I don’t know, regardless of love him or hate him, he’s [ __ ] entertaining. But, um, it’s cuz he It’s cuz he reacted to your gram post. That’s why he wanted to win. He did. He did. He liked that one, which was good. K, I’ve got a Sorry, just on that. Um, Jackson or Greg for your your favorite mountain biker of all time? I mean, it’s it’s a long way to go. He’s got Jackson’s got many many years to go even though he left the left. Jackson is is not the Fresh Prince of Big Air. Will he beat that win record though? Well, I mean at the rate he’s going. It could be could be on the way there. Uh I was going to going to say Loris for for Andor. That’s my TED talk. Um, and I think I’m going to go back to Gracie for women’s. Yeah, I like I like Gracie. Yeah, I’m going too. Yeah, I would just like see Ellie not race with her massive cell phone in her pocket. That’s all I ask. iPhone Max. Yeah. Can someone get her phone number and just start calling her non-stop like right before her run? Oh, I’ll drop the number on the next show. Isn’t that called doxing? Oh, no. That’s where you get their home. That’s where you put their home address. Physical address. Yeah. Yeah. Let’s not do that. Let’s not go that far. Really appreciate that. I’m sure. Should love it. Um, I’m sure one of the one of the Orin brothers is probably gonna win junior men’s, so probably not much point of going too deep into that one. And the junior women’s, I don’t know. Tyler’s gonna win that. Tyler, I mean, I’m down with Tyler winning the race. It’d be good. The junior woman, I don’t know. It’s hard to hard to say. They seem to all be real up and down. Yeah. Then probably um Rosa or Altha surely in the junior woman. Altha’s got a taste for it now. Yeah. Yeah, she’s won one. So, and it’s a it’s a more of a US style track. So, I’m thinking like some US riders will do well this week. Hopefully, Aaron does really well. He’s good on this track. Yeah, Maples, too. Yeah. Yeah. Maples. I mean, Maples has been solid. Could be a pod could be on for a podium. I’ I’d love to see it. For me, it’s my least favorite track of the season, but it’s just fast and dusty. Yeah. Is it better than the looks scary? We’ve we’ve had three different Endoras now. Like is it better than the others? I don’t know. The one that finished down in town looked pretty good. The one into town is iconic. Like that’s a track with every single base covered, you know, like fast, flat, steep, and then the first one. That was the second one. The first one was in 2000. Super early. Yeah, that was like side that was like sidehilling. You just sidehilled along the side of the hill the whole way. There was like no turns in it. It is by far the worst venue. Like it’s so far away from the actual town and and pits. It’s like so awkward. It is a really bad venue. Like you can’t this the sidehill one. You could get there on lifts from the top of the the main lift. Now you’ve got to like go up and if you’re like a privateeer, you have to get your stuff in a shuttle van that takes you over to the where the finish area is. [ __ ] Like, oh, that’s annoying. So awkward for a venue. They obviously spend the money and do whatever they they want. Two things I remember from the original Andura. Uh, one was JD Swingan’s bike falling off the lift during um practice, I think, and got absolutely smoked. And the other was Uh they put Steve Smith’s bike on. It was like a wheel hanging one and they stuck it on the valve and it ripped the valve out. I think this was tube. This would have been tubes days. It ripped the valve out of the tube going up for qualifying I think. And this was like days when people weren’t prepared going up with multiple spare wheels and [ __ ] like that. and he didn’t even get to do his I think he didn’t get to do his qualifying run or it was yeah that’s there’s a couple of my and Pandora memories and then the Affidans won G and Rachel won downhill and Dan won forcross that was pretty cool Sam did Nathan Ranker did a back flip and I got attacked so oh what did that story come up on just recently that um it was on my wind TV cuz Jess didn’t heard this story, so Marsh had to tell it to Jess. That’s right. I was uh I was there with um Brooke and his mom and I remember Ivon’s mom waking us up in the middle of the night being like, “W’s in jail. I just got a call and W’s in jail.” Like, and this was before we had cell phones or anything really with us. And somehow like you’d called the hotel or somehow she found out in the middle of the night. Oh man. And that was going to Fort William after that, eh? We were just I don’t know. Were you staying at the same place we were or something? Yeah, I was at the same hotel with Brooke and his mom. Yeah, that’s so good. I had to uh I had to get Marshy to take all my stuff and just leave my passport at the hotel. Yeah. Can you imagine if that came out this weekend like like Dylan Maples has been locked up? Yeah. Next weekend. the comments because everyone would know that we like um and so Dylan’s just arrived qualify you on World Series Instagram and Pandora who he will start and fall with you and that’s just one of the things that would have happened as well cuz there would have been four or five other yeah and like one of the one of one of the top three junior’s broken collar bone paid that broken collarbone for ages. Oh man, that was a different time. We We I mean, you’re still racing, but man, we raced in a good era. We’re still racing, KB. You’re still racing. Imagine starting now, though, if you just started now. It’s pretty man. Yeah, it’s not quite the same, is it? How good would it be if just got really comfortable at at this level? I mean, obviously is. And then just next year just started being a complete loose unit. Just getting real steamed after races, but just kept going like that. Make that cool again. Chrisaric. Yeah. But um I did ask him in my interview about his um supplements or caffeine cuz he does have the most hype and he said, “Yeah, he takes quite a lot to get hyped up.” So yeah. Really? Yeah. Does he actually like just eat just to get pumped? Taking a lot of supplements. Yeah. Really? So he’s fired up. See his eyes? I I look at his eyes when he’s in the finish area sometimes in the He’s peeking. Oh, he he looks like he’s Yeah. fizzing when he gets to the bottom. You see him in this race right in the last sector. There’s a section where it’s like he was trying to get more speed and it’s like he was pushing the bike like he was trying to make it go as fast as he could and there wasn’t any more speed to make busy kid. Him and Ronan are probably testing the highest levels of caffeine post race. Ronan can’t hardly talk sometimes. He’s like KB. Let’s book out a weekend and we’ll go and drink 10 coffees and then go riding. See what happens. I think I think if you do peak your caffeine levels, it is a performance advantage for a downhill race. Okay, that’s uh let’s book that in the summer. Do a race. All right. Yeah, we got to go and find a race. There’s a club race coming up here in August. Chris, you can race that. I tell you what, if I can if I can ride your 26 in V10, um then I’ll do it. It’s just hanging on the wall. And you have to go cold cold turkey on coffee the week before so that it hits harder. Just real hard. Yeah. No, when if you can send me a focus Gary, I’ll do it. Yeah. [ __ ] We’ll go we’ll go coffee detox. [ __ ] that’d be gnarly. We went coffee detox for a week and then just punch 10 in the morning. That’d be awesome. And then you’ll be you’ll be running you’ll be running around the finish area. We’d be away. Yeah. We’d have to document this. Yeah. All right. It’s uh it’s probably about bedtime here, so we really should wrap it up. Um, thanks again to to Maxis and Fox Suspension for bringing you the podcast. Uh, Virus Brand for helping out the fantasy league and you remember you can use that OTB podcast 15 code with them. Thanks for joining us, Win, we always appreciate your time. Yes. No, it’s been good been good to uh have a yarn again. It’s uh it’s always good to have some factual information from the race. Yeah. And thanks to Wind’s family for loaning him out for the like one and a half days that he’s home. Yeah. Thanks. Thanks. I’ll come along. We’re all quite busy, so it’s not too bad. No, that’s good. And uh with that, we’ll see you next week after Andor Eric. Help.
1 Comment
Big dog 🐕 is back!