BRITISH NAT CHAMPS - rheola forest - WALES July 16, 2007
Posted by paulwalton in : Uncategorized , add a commentHere is a summary of the very wet British National champs from 2007. My trip over was pretty easy this time, flight from Nice to
Bristol where I was welcomed by Tracy and a lot of rain! We drove east to the welsh coast near Swansea and then headed inland toRheola
Forest. It rained all day Friday and turned the track into a river. I walked the track with
Tracy, up and down (no chairlift here) and decided by the end that a canoe would have been better than my boots!!!
The tech site was a far cry from what we normally have at a high level race like this,
Tracy and I spent 2 hours scraping mud and digging a moat to try and get a dry patch to position ourselves for the weekend.
On a more positive note, the track was top class, with some high speed loose rocks at the start, then some technical slippery woods sections, jumps, north shore and a good gradient. We setup everything on Sat morning with the help of Ian Collins we had a pretty dry and organised pit to work from. A quick change of tyres and suspension settings and
Tracy was ready for practice, she went for Wet Scream’s to start with to make sure she could get down ok. As the day progressed, the rain eased up and the track started getting more slippery as the mud dried and turned to greasy clay. By the end of the day it was a tough call on tyres so
Tracy opted to go for the faster intermediate tyres as it looked like she would be using them for race day. This turned out to be a good choice as it forced her to take safe lines and conserve her energy on the pedalling sections. She had a good run and took the win in the seeding run 5sec ahead of Helen Gaskell.
Sunday brought lots more rain and the first hour of the day was spent trying to drain our pit area. Practice went well and the track had actually gotten faster due to the extremely wet conditions, the most difficult part was vision, plenty of tear-offs were going to be needed for the Final.
Tracy was the last girl down and the conditions were dismal, she managed a good run and attacked where she needed to, she managed to hit all her lines and avoid all the trees which littered the track. She commented that removing tear-offs was a really tough job on this track due to its technical nature so she had a few sketchy moments in the process. Overall it was a clean run and she posted the fastest time with Helen Gaskell in 2nd place. So a good weekend for us, well done to
Tracy and Thanks for all the help from Ian, especially his exceptional skills in jet was repair and hose-sucking!!!
WORLD CUP 3 - CANADA June 27, 2007
Posted by paulwalton in : Uncategorized , add a commentIt was a very successful weekend for the Kona Les Gets Factory Team, with all gravity riders making it onto the podium!
The trip went well and we all met in Montreal on Tuesday evening at the airport, squashed our luggage into the car and set out for the 3hr drive. After an hour into the drive, the clouds started appearing in the sky, the closer we got to Quebec the cooler it got and by the time We were 50km from the race it was really raining hard…looked like we were in for another wet race.
We (Tracy, Fabien, Kamil and me) went to walk the DH track on Wednesday. The track was wide open and fast for the most part, with 2 technical sections in the trees, All the riders were happy with the track, but knew it would be a hard race! The rain continued all day Wednesday.
Thursday was first day training, we were well prepared for the track and already had a good idea of what was going to be needed for the bike setup so just put the wet tyres on and the bikes were ready. Tracy and Fabien were also testing out some proto-type 2008 shimano XT components. The day went to plan for everybody and the new parts worked really well.
By Friday it had dried up and the riders were on dry tyres again, a few spots of rain in the morning threatened to change things, but fortunately never turned into much. The 4X training went well for Kamil and he was happy with the track layout.
Saturday was the XC race so the DH training was done on a slightly shorter track than the day before, Tracy and fab did some timed runs and were pleased to see that they were close to the fastest recorded times from the previous day. Kamil had a good qualifying run on Saturday and placed 5th in the 4X.
When I woke up on Sunday morning and looked out to see the bright blue sky, I was relieved that we were finally going to have a dry race!
The qualifying runs went well for Tracy and Fab and they placed 2nd and 4th respectively. Kamil did not do as well as the previous 2 races but he did qualify.
Tracy had a good start to her final and went 3 seconds faster at the split that her first run, but she made a mistake in one of the technical sections and ended lost some of this margin, to end up 1 sec faster than her semi final. The track had become much drier and the loose stones and dust had made the track slower, all the other top riders had gone slower by 3 or 4 sec, so Tracy was happy to have been able to pull her time down. Unfortunately it was not enough to take 1st. Sabrina took the honour.
Final results
Sabrina Jonnier 5:04.45
TRACY MOSELEY 5:06.77
Emiline Ragot 5:16.90
Tracey Hannah 5:16.92
Celine Gros 5:18.77
Men’s Final
By now the track had become really rough and loose, so we decided to make a tyre change at the top for a little more front wheel grip. The track was very physical and lots of high speed so Fabien knew he was in with a good chance, he also wanted to be sure of good finish to build his confidence so had decided to take some safe lines, he knew they were slower, but he did not want to puncture or take any risks. He rode really well and was strong all the way to the line. He did make a couple of small mistakes but still managed to beat his semi-final time and take 5th place. Fabien was really happy with his result as this is the first time in his career where he can say he is riding consistently, he is not yet back to full speed and has more to come by the end of the season.
Final results
Sam Hill 4:29.58
Greg Minnaar 4:31.27
Steve Peat 4:31.30
Matti Lehikonnen 4:33.00
FABIEN BAREL 4:34.64
59th KAMIL TATARKOVIC 4:58.31
FOUR – CROSS
This was the first world cup for Kamil this year where found his form, he was getting good starts and attacking well all through the rounds.
The second round 1/16th saw Kamil take the lead from the gate, but then he was crashed into by another rider, they both went down, but Kamil managed to get going again and make his way to 2nd place to advance to the 1/8th final.
He had some tough rounds but managed to steer clear of trouble and made it to the final.
The nights racing had shown that the race would be lost or won in the first turn. So, for Kamil it was going to be tough gate choice, he was against lopes, Polc and Scott Beamont. He was expecting Lopes to take a big lead off the gate and then pull in behind him at the first turn to close out the attack from 3rd and 4th. Things did not go exactly to plan for Kamil because he had an amazing gate and was along side Lopes until the first turn, this made him go really wide and left the gap open for Polc and Beamont. Kamil tried to attack again on the 2nd turn to get back a place but he had lost too much time and speed on the first turn so he had to sit out the rest of the run in 4th place. He managed to get back to the pack by the finish but it was not enough to improve his position.
Final Results
Brian Lopes
Scott Beamont
Filip Polc
KAMIL TATARKOVIC
Jared Graves
This was the first time at a world cup where we have had a podium in all the gravity disciplines, so well done guys!
Next Race World cup Schladming!
Maxxis Cup 1 - Portugal March 19, 2007
Posted by paulwalton in : Uncategorized , add a commentMaxxis Cup round 1 – Gouveia
Portugal We all flew into Oporto, Tracy from England, Fab from Argentina, and me from
France.We arrived pretty late so stayed in a hotel nearby the airport and decided to get the bikes built up and ready that evening. I had my work cut out as Fabien had been filming with Freeride entertainment for new world disorder and
Tracy had been training in the mud! The drive to the race was easy because of the new super highway across
Portugal, this is 4th year we have attended the race and the road is now finally finished.Training started on Friday morning and the track was pretty rough and unridden so lots of loose rocks around. Tracy and Fabien were both a bit disappointed with the changes to the track as it was not as good as previous years.Lots of big hucks to flat landings and sketchy metal poles lining the track.The first days training went well and we got the suspension dialled for the big landings and flat pedalling sections. The second day was not so good, Both Tracy and Fabien had big crashes and had to stop training due to the injuries……..
Sunday was race day and both of the riders were sore and stiff, after a few practice runs it seemed like they would be able to race at near full pace.There were over 300 riders and some big names, like the Athertons, Matti and Brendon from Honda, Emiline Ragot, etc….. so training was difficult and the pace was fast! Semi -Final
Tracy had a good solid run and managed to pull a big lead over the rest of the girls, her time was 2:29 and only Emiline was close.The mens race was like a world cup with many of the top riders there, Fabien was not feeling very confident, so decided to ride within his limits and see how he could place, this paid off as he had a consistent run with few mistakes to take the win! His time was 2:09.9. This gave him a 2sec lead over Cedric Gracia.
Final
By now, both Tracy and Fab were suffering from the previous days injuries and generally tired.
Tracy had an average run, but she was not focussed and missed a few lines, this meant that she did not improve on her time from the morning. Emiline and Rachel did and they managed to put a few seconds into Tracy to bump her into 3rd spot.
Tracy was not really worried about her result as she said she is not yet at her optimum physically and on a track that was so demanding she was pleased to have finished how she did.
Fabien had to do a long warm up before the start to get his back and hips free enough to race. Before the start he was confident but knew he wasn’t physically strong enough to go 110% so he decided to stick to his previous run tactics and rode everything slightly conservatively. This allowed him to have a good clean run but a little low on power. He managed to do almost exactly the same time as his first run, but the others managed to go a bit faster. Fortunately Fabiens experience and skill kept his time on the top spot.Julien camellini made an amazing run to come within 0.1 second of Fabien and Cedric Gracia was close behind him in 3rd. Overall this was a great race for the team, and both riders were happy with there level at this point in the season. So well done Guys! They both know there is plenty more to come and once they are onboard the new 2008 Stab Supremes with all the great new products I have in store for them they will have even more ammunition to do the business!!! Next stop, San Remo Italian cup.
2007 season on its way (a week in the mud to get started) February 21, 2007
Posted by paulwalton in : Uncategorized , add a commentBy Paul Walton (team Mechanic)
13th to 20th Feb 2007British Midlands and Wales
After a long time off the bike due to injury, Fabien decided that he wanted to get some early season training done to improve his skills in the wet. I though this would be an ideal time to test some suspension changes and bike modifications for the upcoming season. We decided there would be no better place than the UK and with the very kind offer from Tracy for a place to stay, we packed up our stuff and headed for the airport.
Obviously, trying to travel on a tight budget with 80Kg of luggage is not so easy, so the sweating started early because we did not have any coins for the trolleys, it then continued well into the flight due to the heated discussions at check in. We got airborne on 13th and exchanged sunny Nice for Rainy Birmingham!
Tracy had a good schedule planned for the week so I got straight to work prepping the bikes as soon as we got to her place.
Day 1, we were heading for a well known Track in Wales, Rheola – luckily Steve Jones was there to help us get permission to ride the trails and use vehicles in the forest. I also had the opportunity to risk my life driving his van up and down the WRC track. Things went perfectly all day and even the sun was shining on us, we got plenty of testing done and the suspension modifications worked really well.
The second day was equally efficient as Tracy and Fab managed to tire themselves out on a short track just up the road from Steve Jones’ house. Fabien managed to be the first person to beat Jonesies record, so we had to go out and celebrate that evening. Chris Porter from Mojo came along to help with the drinking and turn the night into a very interesting one…..
Friday was a rest day for the riders, so we got a bit of a lie in and I managed to get the bikes prepped for weekend race. The UK mud really kills the bikes so it was a full service for both of them.
We headed over to the race in Ludlow and were welcomed by a very wet track, the melted snow and rain had really brought what we were looking for - thick, sticky mud. The days practice saw us changing between Wet Scream and Swampthings and playing around with the suspension to get optimum grip and rolling. The transport was well organised but the number of riders made it tough for Tracy and Fab to get lots of runs in so we had to make sure we got there early on Sunday to get some more practice time.
Sunday brought a little warmer weather and the tracked dried a little to make things very sticky indeed. Tracy did her first run and was a bit off her usual pace due to a late night at the BCF awards evening. She had a clean run but was slow on the power sections. Her aim was to be up with the boys and she did that by getting a 2:41 which was about 20sec off the fastest time. Fabien had a different goal, he wanted to ride consistently and cleanly testing his foot and skills against the track, not the other riders. Luckily this made for a good smooth run and posted the fastest time of the day.
Tracy managed to eek a few seconds off her first run and finish up with a 2:38, winning the ladies and being up with the men. Fab decided to take it easy in his second run and his main opposition, Marc Beaumont and Julien Cammelini improved on the first runs, so the gap was closed but Fabiens first run still stood on top. Marc was on the same second 2:17 but the splits were in Fabiens favour. Julien also put in a good effort and made a 2:21.
This was an awesome start to the season for Fabien and Tracy, Fab was really pleased to be ahead of such talented riders and especially Marc because of home track advantage.
Week over and back in France now, time to get some high speed testing done and hone the bikes for the world cups. This was the perfect start to the season and hopefully the success will continue throughout the season for Fab and Tracy.
Next stop Maxxis Cup in Gouveia (Portugal) 17 March
