Irish mountainbikers test the London Olympics course

Three Irish mountain bikers, the male and female Irish National
champions (Robin Seymour and Cait Elliott) and Mel Spath (although
still riding under a German license), had the honour to be invited to
the Olympic Test last weekend in Hadleigh Farm, Essex, an hour east of
London.

Mel (in red skinsuit) descending

The test event was run as a Class 1 mountain biking race on the
Olympic mountain biking course, as a dry run for the London 2012
Olympics. Many countries took the opportunity to send in their Olympic
hopefuls, including both the male and female Beijing Olympic Gold
medalists and many continental and national champions, to inspect the
course, often equipped with GPS devices and head cameras. The course
was open both Friday and Saturday for training, with the race being
run on the Sunday, under Olympic conditions.

The course design made good use of the little height difference in
this naturally flat area, with many tough and steep climbs and very
technical, rocky descents. All Irish riders negotiated the technical
sections comfortably.

5000 spectators and 180 international media lined the spectator
friendly, compact course on a hot and sunny, blue-skied Sunday. The
women were off at 11am with 33 starters and was won by Canadian
Catherine Pendrel in 1:32:04, followed by the US National Champion
Georgia Gould in 2nd and current World Cup Series leader Julie Bresset
(France) in 3rd. First Irish was Mel Spath in 19th place, followed by
Cait in 25th place.

Rider comments:

Mel Spath: “I am happy with my placing under the conditions. A problem
with my rear derailleur meant that I had to cut my training short and
thus didn’t have enough time to familiarize myself with the technical
sections on the course before the race. So in the first 3 laps of the
race I made a few mistakes on those sections, losing quite a bit of
time, but I got into a good rhythm for the last 3 laps and by the end
I felt I was riding the course comfortably and strong. It was great to
be able to race in such a high-profile race against world-class
competition and I am confident with how my form is coming along for
the upcoming world cups.”

Cait Elliott comments on her race: “The pace was ferocious from the
start and coming off the back of the grid meant much of the first lap
was spent losing time fighting for position. The course was very
tough, especially in the heat, with a lot of steep technical climbs
and little chance to recover but I enjoyed the technical rocky
descents. I rode hard but was a bit disappointed my lap times dropped
off a bit towards the end. The atmosphere and experience were
amazing.”

The men’s race followed at 2pm and was dominated by Beijing Olympic
gold medalist, Julien Absalon (France), who finished with a gap of
1:20min ahead of Christoph Sauser (Switzerland) in 2nd and a further
26secs ahead of Karl Markt (Austria) in 3rd.

3-times Olympian Robin Seymour had to abandon the race due to a
mechanical problem.

All of the Irish riders participated as self-funded privateers,
without external or official funding. There will be no Irish mountain
bikers at the London Olympics, since there has been no Irish mountain
bike team in recent years that would have qualified a place for
Ireland. However, the race gave a good insight for what is to be
expected in Rio 2016 which the riders are targeting for Irish
qualification.

Mel and Cait are also attending the final two rounds of the World Cup
Series in the Czech Republic and Italy in August.