For the second weekend running, Gracey Hemstreet (Norco Race Division) and Jackson Goldstone (Santa Cruz Syndicate) ruled the UCI Downhill World Cup for Canada in a scintillating Saalfelden Leogang - Salzburgerland (Austria) round that saw the overall lead of both competitions also change hands.
Both Elite races rewarded absolute commitment from lighter riders on a fan-favourite stop of the WHOOP UCI Mountain Bike World Series, featuring the famous motorway section that would prove decisive for Goldstone.
Goldstone clinched his win by less than a tenth of a second from Loïc Bruni (Specialized Gravity) while Hemstreet enjoyed a wider margin of victory but was made to wait on the edge of her seat until the very end with Valentina Höll (YT MOB) last off the ramp and looking set to snatch the win until the final metres of her run.
Meanwhile Rosa Zierl (Cube Factory Racing) gave the packed Austrian grandstands something to cheer about by winning the women’s Junior Finals and Oli Clark (MS-Racing) made inroads on the overall Men Junior title with his triumph.
A STAR IS BORN AS HEMSTREET BACKS UP MAIDEN WIN
A slow-burn women’s Elite competition exploded into life in the final few runs as Nina Hoffmann (Santa Cruz Syndicate) was absent following a crash in morning practice on the wall run.
Marine Cabirou (Canyon CLLCTV Factory Team) required Q2 to reach the final but showed she was keen to make up for lost time at The Epic Bikepark.
Nailing the exit from a tricky root section into the iconic flat-out motorway section is the key to The Speedster trail and Cabirou flew through the first two time checks, smashing Harriet Harnden’s previous best run for AON Racing - Tourne Campervans by four cavernous seconds.
As rider after rider crossed the line without even getting in touching distance of Cabirou, a first Saalfelden Leogang – Salzburgerland victory and ninth career UCI World Cup seemed more and more likely… until Hemstreet went down the ramp.
Immediately ahead, Hemstreet lost some time in time check three but piled it all back on and more at the next one as she hammered the steep forested section that was the last opportunity to make up serious time.
She crossed the line three seconds ahead of Cabirou and the podium soon became Canada followed by America as Anna Newkirk (Frameworks Racing / 5DEV) missed out on a first UCI World Cup win since 2019 by less than a second.
That meant it was all down to star-crossed fastest qualifier, home favourite and reigning UCI World Champion and World Cup overall winner Höll, who looked destined to complete a rampant hat-trick on local trails when she went a second up at the penultimate time check for YT MOB.
But the Hollywood script was rejected as Höll likewise fell victim to Hemstreet’s scintillating finish and slipped to third to audible groans from the crowd, handing Hemstreet a dream second win in the space of two weekends. She becomes the sixth rider to back up a maiden win with another consecutive win following in the footsteps of a certain Höll and Cabirou in 2021 and 2019.
“I definitely didn’t [expect that], I hadn’t really been feeling too confident this week and it just clicked. There actually felt a lot more pressure than I expected, I struggling at the motorway all week but I just pedalled as hard as I could. I felt it at the bottom so I was happy,” Hemstreet said.
And Hemstreet’s supremacy means she’s also the new overall UCI World Cup leader after Tahnée Seagrave (Orbea / FMD Racing) started strongly but appeared bothered by an old injury in the more technical second half as she hemorrhaged time and wound up sixth while winless Höll is still waiting for her title defence to truly ignite.
GOLDSTONE FLOATS TO MAPLE DOUBLE
The jumbled men’s Elite qualifying meant stars were littered across the startlist and there was action throughout, beginning with the second run of the finals as Ronan Dunne (Mondraker Factory Racing DH) unclipped but still became the first rider of the weekend to break the three-minute barrier after disappointment in Loudenvielle-Peragudes (France) - he’d finish fifth overall.
‘Double O’ Oisin O’Callaghan (YT MOB) was in touch with his compatriot until he was spat off a tough triple-apex corner and hit the deck hard, before his teammate and home hero Andreas Kolb almost sent the crowd into rapture as he exited the woods in the green but his slender 0.066s advantage was dashed on the run to the line.
However, Dunne’s reign ended four minutes later when Lachlan Stevens-McNab (Trek Factory Racing DH) put together the scorching run he’s been threatening all season - he was ahead at the opening round in Bielsko-Biała (Poland) when he crashed but nothing could stop the Kiwi this time as he went into the hot seat.
Despite winning the opening round, Bruni needed a big run to re-establish himself in the overall fight after a poor showing last time out and he produced it, resetting the otherwise tight men’s field by putting 1.4 seconds into Stevens-McNab.
It didn’t last long though as Jackson Goldstone played to his strengths - floating like a butterfly over the stump section and motorway before launching an unbelievable pull into the wall run showing commitment which paid off when he crossed the line ahead of Bruni by the blink of an eye - 0.059s.
With plenty of household names still to go including fastest qualifier Loris Vergier in the rainbow bands and UCI World Cup leader Amaury Pierron (both Commencal Muc-Off by Riding Addiction), Goldstone was far from home and hosed and he was visibly shaking as he watched the remaining riders. However, the strongest challenge came from unheralded Canyon CLLCTV Factory Team rider Henri Kiefer.
The German was the only rider apart from Bruni and Goldstone to lead a sector as Pierron always looked unsettled and nearly came a cropper on several occasions with the green jersey appearing heavy on the Frenchman’s back on the way to 17th place, and Vergier couldn’t replicate his rapid Friday pace as his 1,000-day wait for another UCI World Cup win continues.
Goldstone’s win was even more emotional in the wake of fellow Santa Cruz Syndicate rider Hoffman’s crash earlier, while teammate Laurie Greenland finished fifth and was the first to congratulate the Canadian after Vergier crossed the line.
“That last split and the stump section going into the motorway, those were the two crucial sections for me that I needed to work on and I definitely felt like I couldn’t have got those better in my run,” Goldstone said.
“It’s just crazy, you go through all the emotions of the riders getting close to beating your time and it’s so many ups and downs, you feel for the guys that went down or had mistakes in the run, it’s just a rush of emotions.”
Pierron’s slump means Bruni takes over the UCI World Cup lead with an advantage of 45 points over Goldstone, who said in his winner’s interview that Bruni had joked he won’t speak to the Canadian for a week after such a close-fought race.
HOME FANS REVEL IN JUNIOR TRIUMPH
Rosa Zierl kicked off Downhill finals day in the best way possible for the partisan home crowd, the Austrian national champion was the final rider off the ramp and duly saved the best until last to oust Aletha Ostgaard (Canyon CLLCTV Factory Team).
Ostgaard had been the class of the field, over four seconds quicker than the next best rider, but Zierl traded fastest sector times with the American early on. She never decisively pulled away on the course but overturned a deficit of a second at the penultimate intermediate time check to lead ahead of the final section and went clear in the final few hundred metres.
“It’s incredible, I’m super happy, tight battle with the girls. I knew this track so I was just keen to ride it and have fun,” Zierl said afterwards.
Oli Clark denied overall leader Max Alran (Commencal Muc-Off by Riding Addiction) a second successive Leogang triumph in the men’s junior final, by less than a second.
Asa Vermette (Frameworks Racing / 5DEV) had set the time to beat before the two fastest qualifiers were unleashed onto the mountain, but they showed it was a two-horse race as Alran led through the first two sections before letting victory slip through his fingers.
“It’s pretty surreal, I’ve been working hard to get here so I’m just happy to be here, I’m glad it’s paying off,” Clark said. “I don’t feel pressure, the only pressure I put on is myself.”
Alran and the rest of the UCI Downhill World Cup don’t have long to wait to return to action with just two weeks until the next round at Val di Sole-Trentino in Italy, with qualifying on June 20 and Hemstreet and Goldstone looking for a rare hat-trick on Saturday, June 21.
However, the WHOOP UCI Mountain Bike World Series thrills and spills are still far from over in Saalfelden Leogang – Salzburgerland this weekend as Sunday sees the cross-country Olympic and enduro races take centre stage.
