» Downhill and Cross Country Racing at Sea Otter

Sunday marked the final day of the Sea Otter Classic and the culmination of two major races. Those are the pro Downhill and the pro Cross Country races. These two races are completely different from one another. Downhill pits the athletes against each other in a time trial run which is over for most athletes in less than two and a half minutes. Cross Country is about true endurance and stamina as well as pace and strategy. Downhillers race bikes which more closely resemble motorcycles minus the motor. While there is a hardtail class in the downhill competition, the pros all race DH specific bikes which are beefier and have massive amounts of suspension travel. The pro Cross Country racers on the other hand will race almost exclusively hardtails made of carbon fiber with lightweight forks with only a couple inches of suspension travel.

Photo by Bryan & Jamie Sheasby

The day started out with the Downhill competition. Each competitor screamed by sending a rush of air at the spectators on the sidelines of the course followed by a dust cloud. When the pro men were done less then a second separated the top four and less than a tenth of a second separated first and second place. Mick Hannah won with a time of 02:08.18 followed by Greg Minnaar with a time of 02:08.24. For the Women there was less than a second between the top two. Tracy Moseley won with a time of 02:21.60 narrowly beating Melissa Buhl who finished with a time of 02:22.20. Not all the athletes were happy with their performances as several navigated the sketchy descents skillfully only to eat dirt on the final jump within feet of the finish line.

By mid day the heat had ratcheted up to ninety degrees Fahrenheit so the race was shortened from a forty nine mile ride for the men into a twenty nine mile race and from a forty mile ride for the women into a twenty mile race. This disappointed the racers but also changed the strategy as most of the pros could easily sprint such a distance. The course this year took the Cross Country riders out halfway on the Laguna Seca racetrack and then out onto the dirt for the twenty mile loop. Before the men even got off the race course there was already a pileup which slowed down a big portion of the field.

For the pro men Christoph Sauser broke out into an early lead and extended that lead into a more then four minute gap between himself and the nearest competitor. For the women Georgia Gould won with a one minute gap between herself and the nearest competitor. The two racers behind her were gaining though and if the race had been full distance the results might have been different.

Written by Bryan Sheasby