Morvélo Test Team DH ripper Joe Connell has been a busy boy recently. Here's what he's been up to:
SDA Rd.2 - Glencoe - May 2012
On Friday afternoon I headed up to Glencoe for the 2nd round of the SDA series. After setting up, I walked up the hill to check out the track. I was surprised with how good the track looked, usually after a winter of rain and snow the track is pretty nailed but it looked as though some hard graft had been put in to fix some bits. With the little changes that had been made to the track, the weekend looked set be pretty fun! After walking the track, it was time for some dinner and a good night’s sleep.
On Saturday morning I got up, got myself sorted and then headed up on the chairlift to do some practice runs. The track was running well, it was dry, rolling fast and plus the sun was out on form! I felt good on the track, I had worked on some good lines for the race and there were no midges!
On Sunday I got up early and did two runs in practice before getting myself ready to race. My first race run didn't go too well. I came back to the van and thought about a few things that I could do to improve on my time. A couple of hours later and it was time to head up for my second race run. In my run I did the things that I wanted to do and I ended up taking quite a bit of time off my first run. In the end I got 2nd in the juniors and 4th overall which I was pretty happy with as I have always crashed or had mechanicals at Glencoe in the past, I guess not having a rear mech helps!
IXS European Series - Leogang, Austria - May 2012
On the Monday after the Glencoe SDA, Me, Ronan Taylor, Gaz Neale and Emma Neale packed up the camper van with all of our bikes and kit and headed across to Europe. The journey to Leogang in Austria wasn't too bad mainly because I could just chill out in the back of the camper whilst Gaz drove the whole time! When we arrived in Leogang on Wednesday night we just hit the hay as we had been travelling for most of the day.
On Thursday morning we got set up and built our bikes. In the afternoon I walked the track, it looked like it was going to a sick weekend of riding and racing, there were some open turns at the top, Flat out wood sections and some jumps on the pedaling sections that are good for a few whips in practice and flat landing in race runs!
The format of the race was pretty relaxed as practice didn't start until 2pm on Friday. The track was so much fun to ride in practice and it was also pretty easy to remember so there was no rush to do loads of runs. After practice we just chilled in the evening sun, we finished off the day with some of prime pork stir fry that Emma kindly cooked up for us.
On Saturday I headed up the hill to get in some more practice before qualifying in the afternoon. Half-way through practice I had a bit of a digger which knocked the wind out of me pretty bad and grazed my arm up, after this crash I decided to stop early for practice as I was a bit shaken up. After I got some good lunch inside me I still had a five hour wait until my quail run so I decided to go and hit up the A-line style track that Leogang has, I was following Ronan down and just having a sick time insiding the turns and sending the jumps, It felt good to break up the long wait with something that was fun and not going to tire me out for quails. Eventually quails came around and it was time to head up the hill for my run. I wanted to use my qualifying run as a gage of where I was at and no more. I came down with 3.42 which put me in 49th in Elite, my run was pretty solid but I made a few mistakes that I knew that I could fix for the finals.
On Sunday I had plenty of time in practice to check out some stuff on track and get it dialed in before my race run. Mid-afternoon and it was time to race, I had a pretty solid run and managed to take five seconds off of my qualifying time which put me in a solid 42nd overall and 3rd in the juniors. Overall the weekend was a whole load of fun and it was great for some preparation before the WC Val di Sole!
UCI World Cup Val di Sole
On Wednesday night we arrived at Val di Sole after having spent a few days riding in Schladming, following the IXS in Leogang. Gaz managed to get the campervan into a prime spot for us to stay for the weekend, about as close to the finish as we could possibly get.
On Thursday I got sorted and headed up the gondola for a track walk. On the way up on the gondola I could already see the newly taped sections for the race coming out into the open under the lift. The track had had a few changes made to it over the winter, now some of the rough rocky sections had been taken out and replaced by some fresh loamy turns and off camber sections. The track had a few newer sections but most of it remained just as rough and flat out as in previous years.
Friday practice started off pretty early, I headed up for my first run to find that the track was just as rough as usual, even thought it was the start of practice. The new turns were super soft and easy to blow out, but still fun to ride. As per usual, the many rocks that litter the track were hidden under an ever changing layer of dust which meant that line choice was just as much about getting a line that would last rather than just finding the ‘fastest’ line. I was getting on well with the track and I had a few good lines that I felt smooth on.
When qualifying came around on Saturday afternoon, Val Di Sole was living up to its name as the Sun was beating down! In my run I set off out of the gate and sprinted towards the start of the first rough section, 20 seconds in and I was coming in to a right turn on the first new section of track, my front starting going and before I could even start to unclip I had hit the deck. I got back up and got going again, when I went down I must have eat some dust literally as the whole way down after my mouth was like an old ashtray, horrible! I got to the bottom and looked around at my time, I hadn’t made the cut for qualifying which I was pretty bummed out about. I headed back to the camper got cleaned up and came back to watch the rest of qualifying, it was good to see fellow Scotsman, Fraser Mcglone get a solid 49th which secured his place in the finals. After qualifying I just chilled out and got my stuff sorted. In the evening there was some pretty wild 4X racing going off so that made for some good watching!
Although the weekend was cut short, I still gained some very valuable experience and it was good to be back at the world cups for the first time this year. Thanks to Gaz for all of the driving and keeping my bike running smooth the whole time. JC