Saturday in Maribor.

Last night everybody trucked into town for the Maribor premier of Clay Porter’s epic First.

A lot of the stars of the film turned up to greet the Slovenian crowd.

Dirt TV were on hand to film the after show party, which mainly involved the presenter (Cunny) getting trashed.

The weather is still hot and sunny, and the track is running fast as. Victor reckoned that Hill looked to be having the most fun up there, but Peaty, Gee and Barel are all looking pretty fast and relaxed. I grabbed a quick interview with Hill which you can watch later on Dirt TV.

The rock garden is attracting big crowds with a few nasty smashes so far, but there is a fast line developing straight down the middle. Kovarik told me that he will be racing the full World’s series. The official timed training results are:

Florent Payet 2:56.76
Steve Peat 2:58.56
Joris Bigoni 2:57.92
Julien Camellini 2:58.30
Fabien Barel 2:58.51
and Hill on a 3:07.02

In the Elite women Rach A is looking fastest through the rocks with Moseley and Gaskell not too far behind. Sabrina has some good speed, and also my tip for the future Florianne Pugin is looking good.

Rach A 3:22.20
Floriane Pugin 3:21.44
Sabrina Jonnier 3:23.36

There’s a big contingent of Brits out here some like Gaz Brewin and Katy Curd racing World Cups for the first time.

The 4-cross racings snaps off at 16.30 local time, Dan Atherton has been looking super smooth all practise and was one of the first to hit the big lines, Lopes is here on a carbon fibre Ibis hardtail and has drawn Longden and Will Evans in the first round. Gee has announced that he’s not racing 4 cross this year.

Chris Ball has his new UCI red shirt on and is keeping things running smoothly. There’s loads of film crews out here, Clay, Rankin, New World Disorder, Rob Warner is doing some live commentary, the re-Focus crew have brought there camera dolly all the way here, Callum Swift is sleeping in a toy tent in the car park.