Archive for the ‘racing news’ Category

Like two other big UCI mountain bike teams also MS EVIL RACING decided to stay one more week in Leogang to compete the growing and well organized IXS cup event series.

 

After a world cup weekend affected by loads of rain, we had good weather from Monday on and so it would have been a good time for just riding and testing. Nevertheless MS EVIL RACING decided to do some sightseeing and so we went to the world of Red Bull better known as Salzburg.
First off all we visited the international team manager of Steve and Luke in the head quarter of Red Bull in Fuschl. It’s a quiet cool building without any red Bull signs, but really cool architecture. While Steve and Filip got some stuff of the new Red Bull athletes collection the rest of the team had the chance to have closer look into what’s going on in the heart of Red Bull.

 

Right after that we had a date in Salzburg city for a sightseeing tour in the Hangar 7, which is a kind of museum for all the airplanes of the so-called Flying Bulls. We got it managed to get a special tour with the boss of the “flying bulls”, who led us through the holy halls of the Red Bull Hangar 8, where Red Bull keeps a crowed of mechanics and engineers busy with restoring old airplanes and keep them running. It’s really special to get into this service hangar and to have a look in the inside of the infamous DC-6. The boss of the flying bulls mentioned that every once in a while the boss of Red Bull Didi Mateschitz himself show up at the hangar to fly with one of the airplans… and by luck it has happen. It was a quiet special situation for Steve and Filip to see the man, who support them for so many years… not just with money, but also with whole power of Red Bull.

 

Next day it was the birthday of Luke, which get celebrated with a traditional Austrian Sacher Torte and for sure loads of beer.

 

 

 

 

On Friday we have been back on “race mode” and we all have been pretty focused on the competition. Even it was no world cup there have been a lot of really good rides such as Justin Leov or Nick Beer who leads in the overall of the IXS cup.

 

Saturday starts with the DH qualifications and finishes the 4X race where Filip became 3rd right.
After the qualification all riders have been qualified in really good positions except Brook who had a mechanical in his qualifying run. His early start in the race run bestows Brook a really long time in the hot seat, which means about 140 riders. Brook just got beaten by 4 other riders including his team-mate Steve Smith who become 2nd with 0.233 seconds off Justin Leov.

 

 

 

In the end we had 5 riders in the top 15 and Lewis is 2nd in the overall of the European IXS cup series.

 

1.Justin Leov, Trek
2.Steve Smith, MS EVIL RACING
3.Nick Beer, Scott 11
4.Marcus Klausmann, Ghost
5.Brook MacDonald, MS EVIL RACING
7.Luke Strobel, MS EVIL RACING
11. Lewis Buchanan, MS EVIL RACING
15. Filip Polc, MS EVIL RACING

 

Complete results.

 

 

 

 

It’s easy to write that the UCI worldcup of Leogang Austria was a jawing match, but there are no words to describe how bad the conditions were.
Hoshi Yoshida followed MS EVIL RACING throughout the weekend and documented the conditions with his camera- check it out:

 

 

Thanks to Hoshi for those impressions.

 

 

 

After 2 weeks off the world cup with some good results in “Balaton DH” and the “wheels of speed” we have been ready for the 3rd world cup round of Leogang/ Austria. The omen was good for some good results at these races, but our hopes curbed after a bad crash of Steve on Friday in the first training. A broken helmet and the sign of a concussion made it necessary for Steve to stay in the hospital for the night.

 

Even Steve was still handicapped by the crash he was willing to do the seeding and qualified 23rd. With 16th in place of Luke, Filip in 37th, Brook in 44 and Lewis in 71st position all riders were qualified for the race and so we had good chances to annul our bad result in the team ranking of the last world cup round in Fort William/ SCO.

 

Right after the downhill qualification Filip needed to race four cross, which was not an easy task as the track was challenging. The course builder Guido Tschugg built a cool track with many options and some sections which separate the wheat from the chaff. As usual a course like this is the right thing for Filip where he may show his skills. He was the man of the race as he showed different lines, incredible passing moves and racing from the best- 7th place.

 

For Sunday the downhill race day the boys were hungry and we have been ready to prove that we are better than we have been in Scotland. Lewis was first of the squat going down the hill and finished 59th. Brook landed on 27th, Filip on 22nd, Luke on 12th and Steve on 11th… pretty good comeback and a rise from the 15th place in the team ranking back in the top 8.

 

Now we are staying for one more week in Leogang to compete the IXS cup next weekend. In the meantime we are going to chill out and do some testing- so if you want to ride with the guys, come to Leogang and maybe you are lucky and meet them somewhere on the track.

 

 

Here you will find the results.

 

Stay tuned for some impressions coming soon!