What's tragic to me is a flat pedal rider at the level of Bryceland wearing some garbage shoes and costing him results where he would do well. Sad.
Maybe he will clip back in now. If I'm not mistaken he had a 2nd and a 3rd last year while clipped in. When he isn't, he mostly just crashes. How many times does he need to do this?
Yeah, he was pretty fast until he wrecked. Pretty much like in France last year were he lost it all 30 metres before the finish line.
what do you mean garbage shoes. In this pic from http://www.mtb-news.de/ it sure looks to me like he's running 5.10 rubber
The race was just epic, Gwin is incredible, there are no other words for the way he rides that bike, mind blowing!
there's a pic from practice on one of the big sites (Tri-ride maybe?) it clearly showed Rat Boy racing with some kind of hightop Fox shoes, but if you look closely you could see they were resoled with Stealth Rubber. Regardless, there doesn't seem to be another rider that talented that has so many pedal/shoe issues as him.edited to add:
what do you mean garbage shoes. In this pic it sure looks to me like he's running 5.10 rubber
though I tend to agree with the others that say that on really rough tracks, clipless pedals can keep your feet on the pedals much better than flats...
I mean, re-soled with Stealth rubber or not, he always seems to be wearing some floppy, skate-style shoe from one of his sponsors rather than a proper flat-pedal DH shoe.
Yeah as much as it is nice to see Gwin's down right speed, he is just boring to watch as a spectator..mechanic's (skill) wise he has it all there, i would like to see a little showmanship out of him. Hope for him to win it all again but would like to see him pushed by Steve S. an Greg to keep it fun...
That is a http://www.mtb-news.de/ picture. I thought they had their watermark on it, and linked to it. I'm not trying to steal their images or anything... hope that's ok. I'll go and edit my post to reflect where the image comes from...
I kind of think the only ones who could push him is a 100% Gee and maybe Sam Hill as the season progresses.
I think right now Minaar is pushing him quite hard, if he gives 100% he is able to beat Gwin (as he showed in SA), even though he doesn't look as fascinating as Hill or as strong as Gee Atherton!
Gee looked really good yesterday...an hill is just plain fun to watch, that's an awesome top 5
Yeah, when they started talking "spleen" with reference to Brosnan, it didn't sound good.
I thought the exact same thing, he's stepped up his game for sure.
World Cup overall with 5 wins and winning Val Di Sole by 8 seconds isn't enough showmanship for you? Maybe you should check out a different sport than downhill mountain bike racing.
I never really understood why Greg had that reputation. He's always performed well at MSA and Fort Bill, and I've alsways undertood those to be gnarly and technical. I've always thought of Greg as a master of smooth, making technical courses look easy, and therefore less exciting to watch. Kinda the same thing people are saying about Gwin now.
and on a brand new product no less. If I'm not mistaken, this was the first WC race those things were used on. (Unless Gwin had prototype versions of them but they weren't public about them)
they were semi public about them, he was running them from leogang on last year i think. I think this is the all new product, he was running the proto in the old fork. They also said they had an all new damper.
Minaar surely did give 100%. what he meant i think was hes not willing to risk his health on a track like that. meaning if you push it past 100% and lose that gamble you will get hurt, probably badly.
you could not be more incorrect.....
you're adorable.
but does he have the sammy 5.10's?!?!?!
oh there will be more to come
Damn, this made me realize that a friend of my gf broke her leg in a car accident this winter in a similar way that Gee broke his. She's fairly athletic, rides a lot of road and cross country skiing, and her doctor told her not to expect to be in 100% strength within a year or so. Gee making that run this early really makes me excited for the rest of the season!
not sure if sarcastic... if not, start a thread in the Lounge... this thread is to talk about racing. please.
I think there may be some correlation there - this is just my opinion. Minnaar is a smart guy and he wants to win, but he realizes that gambling on a track like Val di Sole can cost him a lot more than just a single race. If Gwin feels like he is "protected" or that his belief will prevent anything terrible from happening to him, then he is going to be a lot more willing to let it all hang out. Again, this is just speculation on my part. I will say that watching Gwin's run yesterday and the discussion about his suspension setup, I thought "he must be one seriously strong mofo".
Minnaar is monster on the motorway at the end.
