This weekend saw the Gauteng DH Championships take place. It was the last race of the season and turned out to be a rather eventful occasion.

It started out with a rather heated debate on the Saturday as to which sections of the Heldekruin track should be used for the race. There was talk of cutting out the sort steep ending in favor of the longer but flatter route. A lot of the Elite riders were pretty unhappy about this and over the next 24 hours plans as to how the race would be run change 3 or 4 times. This made practice rather difficult as riders never quite knew what lines to practice. Finally on the race morning it was decided that Elites should race the shorter / steeper route, and that all the other classes would race the longer track for safety reasons.

Racing got underway just before lunch with one seeding run for each rider, and then a final race run planned for later in the day. No sooner had the first riders jumped on the shuttle and the bad weather started to roll in. The hard tails and sub vets made it down in the dry, but half way through the sport class it began raining. By the time the last sport rider had come down the rain was pouring down and the lightening forced the racing to come to the stop. Some of the Elites chose to come down the access road and take shelter at the bottom of the hill, however the vast majority were stuck up the hill under the staging tent.

As the Elites hadn’t had a chance to ride qualifying there couldn’t be a conclusive result, so there was talk of calling off the entire event and running it at a later date. After about an hour of sitting it out the clouds finally broke and the decision was made to restart the event as a one run winner takes all race. The seeding runs fell away and all the riders made their way back to the top of the hill. The track was now incredibly wet however it was drying pretty fast in the sunny and windy conditions.

By the time racing got underway there were only a few puddles left on the track, however the course was still deceptively slippery. Add to this that the small stream at the bottom of the track had turned into a raging river and the finish line had to be mover 20 meters back as riders simply could ride through the current.

The Elite racing really was amazing with all the guys going flat out to take the title in this one off race. Neil Fourie was going for gold, and held nothing back in his preparation. Even if the aerodynamics weren’t quite in his favor, the side pipe in his skin suit certainly made most of his competitors rather uneasy which no doubt played in his favor. Unfortunately a front wheel flat put an end to his chances half way down the track.

Brad Illingworth was looking super fast all weekend but was having mechanical problems which held him back in the long pedaling sections. He none the less powered through it and came storming down the hill to set a fastest time of 1:20 early on in the race. Crossing the line it was clear that he wasn’t happy though, and the disappointment was evident when he suggested he wanted to rip his rear derailer off and throw in in the river after his run.

Dirk Vanschalkwyk was fast and consistent all day, and never looked out of place on the track. Dirk was also rocking the new Titanium Designs kit (which looks awesome) so he was definitely looking the part. Although he didnt look as quick as some of the others down the steep shoot, he was obviously flying down the top section as he crossed the line with a very impressive 1:16 to take over the hot seat.

Last man down the Hill was Ryno Fourie and all I can say is what happened next was an absolute tragedy. Ryno was absolutely flying down the track! I can honestly say that no one had come down the hill like that the entire weekend. When he came over the crest of the mountain and around the fast right hander what he and his bike were doing defied all logic, and it literally looked like he was on rails. The crowd went mental as he approached the finish line in what certainly looked like the fastest time of the day. However to everyones disappointment it turned out that the timing equipment had malfunctioned and his run had not been recorded. Ryno was offered another run, however it was clear that he was absolutely exhausted and had put everything he had into his first attempt. He was shuttled back up the hill but unfortunately crashed on his second attempt putting him out of the running. Seeing a rider miss out due to a technical fault when his performance clearly was so outstanding really is a tough one to swallow.

A special mention must also go out to Matt Smith who won the Sub Vet class with the 3rd fastest time of the day which was set on the longer track. A really great performance considering that the times before and after his were all set on the shorter course.

The event really was an awesome one and had to be one of the most exciting ones on the year. Thanks to Francois and crew for all the hard work, as well as Red Bull, TSG, Mikes Bikes, and Skull Candy for sponsoring all the prizes.

We will have pics up shortly but for now are the full list of results.

Hard tails:

1) Tiaan Maartens 1:35.09
2) Mike Prinsloo 1:41.59
3) Dustin Rudman 1:42.33
4) Hennie Blignaut 2:01.33

Juniors:

1) David Hogan 1:27.29
2) Vivian Viljoen 1:33.08

Sports calss:

1) David Hogan 1:27.29
2) Louis Van Sandwyk 1:29.81
3) Jonathan Sherwood 1:30.03
4) Patrick Alexander 1:32.28
5) Warren Garbutt 1:32.35
6) Sean Shepherd 1:32.93
7) Vivian Viljoen 1:33.08
8 ) Lee Stopforth 1:36.16
9) Laurentius Potgieter 1:39.15
10) Kyle Mclaren 1:39.51
11) Des Ellis 1:45.67
12) Dallin Nel 1:47.57

Sub Vets:

1) Matt Smith 1:22.16
2) Damion Van Tromp 1:31.66
3) Sean o’Flynn-Madden 1:32.57
4) Antonio Silva 1:35.05
5) Nolan Couzyn 1:38.69

Elite:

1) Dirk Van Schalkwyk 1:16.18
2) Brad Illingworth 1:20.63
3) Dricus pretorius 1:23.03
4) Cornel Claassen 1:23.03
5) Andries Van Wyk 1:24.23
6) Kruger Breed 1:24.26
7) Joshua Liebenberg 1:26.28
8 ) Emile Raubenheimer 1:28.56
9) Marius Snyman 1:35.49
10) Ryno Fourie 1:40.89
11) Neil Fourie 2:09.59

Tags: Gauteng Downhill Championships, Heldekruin

This entry was posted on Tuesday, October 27th, 2009 at 10:02 am and is filed under Downhill, Events. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.