Just one week on from the controlled madness of Orange Monkey’s first World Cup
experience on the new Dalby Forest circuit in Yorkshire came the biggest one of
them all, The Houffalize World Cup. This race is without doubt the most nostalgic
event in the Mountain Biking calendar and has now run in Houffalize for the past
18 years!
The team took Chris for his second World Cup in as many weeks to the nerve jangling
town in the far south of Belgium. The people of Belgium treat cycling like the British
treat football, with heart and passion and you could sense the excitement just walking
around this alpine resort looking town.
The team arrived on Friday afternoon after an early start and quickly got the essentials
out of the way before getting out on course with Chris completing two laps with
his coach, Paul. It was then off to our fourth country of the day as we made our
way to our hotel in Luxembourg only 20 minutes down the road!
Saturday morning and two more laps along with some start loop practice on the notoriously
steep first climb and then it was time to grab a bite to eat and enjoy the Junior
race which produced another great result for the Brits with Kenta Gallagher picking
up a sixth place!
The course was extremely dry with dust flying everywhere; this place has everything,
steep climbs, technical descents and a superb amount of Belgian encouragement! The
arena was buzzing with the best riders in the world calmly going about their business.
The coolest team was of course Cannondale who with Fumic, Fontana, Gujan and Paulisson
have the coolest riders on the circuit! As we sat looking over the arena having
a coffee and awaiting the team managers meeting the word was that rain was forecast
for tomorrow but nothing was going to dampen our spirits!
Sunday morning arrived, as indeed did the rain! The women kicked off proceedings
and endured a tough race with the course going from dust to mud and the descents
very tricky. It made for an exciting race to watch but gave us a headache as the
sun then came out. Tyre choice was going to be an important factor in this one and
with the forecast still very much up in the air we decided to go for a Schwalbe
Racing Ralph on the back and a Rocket Ron on the front, that was until 30 minutes
before race start when the heavens opened once more and we switched to full Rocket
Rons.
As the gun went the 230 riders charged towards the first steep climb with Cannondale
Factory rider Manual Fumic storming into an early lead and coming out of the start
loop with a 15 second lead over the field. Chris stuck to the plan and took a steady
ride up not going too far into the red and this was justified when the race bottle
necked on the first real descent leaving rider literally fighting for position.
A surreal few minutes followed as the queue to get down the first descent unfolded.
After the chaos of the first lap Chris then started to show his strength as he moved
up through the field before a crash on one of the many slippery descents put him
back and needing to do it all over again! It was great riding and showed he is back
on form after recent illness, finishing 184th out of the 230 starters. The race
was eventually won by Hermida after a valiant effort by Fumic to stay away for the
entire race!
As we made our way back to Luxembourg for one final night we were justified in celebrating
what has been an historic 2 weeks for the team competing in two World Cups, one
being the biggest of them all and next week its off to Reading for the next round
of the British Series! We have learnt many things over the past two weeks but one
thing is for sure, the Belgians love their cycling!