Round one of the 2011 UCI World Cup in Pietermaritzburg, South Africa kicks off on 24th April and work has already started revamping the 2009 WC track.

The PMB World Cup course got a bit stick in 2009 for being a touch pedally but it sounds like the organisers have taken that onboard and are spending alot of time and effort improving things.

Greg Minnaar and Tracy Moseley won back in 2009, check the videos below for a trip down memory lane.

Nigel Hicks, head of design and building, sent over photos and news of the what the crew have being doing down at Pietermaritzburg:

Preparations for the 2011 World Cup in Pietermaritzburg are well underway with the Downhill and Cross Country Courses being redesigned and built from scratch to incorporate more technical sections. The 4 Cross Course will be very similar to the 2009 track however the course has been shortened and will incorporate some extra obstacles to tighten up the racing.

The Downhill Course for 2011 will be 2.81km long with an elevation drop of approximately 345m, starting approximately 50m further up the hill from the 2009 course. The overall course direction is the same but the course has been modified to incorporate a number of steeper and rocky sections.

The course begins out of the start hut with a road jump into a drop off and a left hand berm. This leads into the 2nd straight which crosses the beginning of the old course and turns into some off camber kinked corners. The end of the straight is a tight off camber right into a 5 foot dropoff onto a 20m road section. This road leads into a sharp lefthand hairpin onto the Cloud 9 rock drop of the old 2009 course. The main Cloud 9 rock drop is the same as 2009 however the exit has been changed to incorporate a steeper, rocky off camber exit.

The course has a large g-out over a road before entering Pebble Beach through a tight right hand turn over a large rock with a number of line options. This leads into the main rock feature at Pebble Beach which is a large 6 foot drop off the rock into a small berm which leads into a large rock garden.

As the rider exits the rock garden they will have to put in a couple of pedals to clear a large road gap jump which lands into a fast section with a couple of flyoff drops. A pump roller leads into a large double before the drop into the singletrack section at Driftage. The singletrack section ends with a small rock garden leading into a flyoff jump. A couple of bermed corners and the rider drops into the Dr Evil drop and the large hipped gap jump above the main Gully. Speed increases to a good 50km/h as the rider hits the fly in jump into the main gully. The rider exits the rough gully over a fadeaway stepdown into the 2 main 20m long tabletops on the “N3 highway”. The pedalling section from 2009 has been altered by adding in a number of pump-rhythm sections using rollers, tabletops, doubles and berms.

The rhythm section leads into a short pedal section towards the “bombhole”. The stepdown into the” bombhole” remains the same as the 2009 course which exits into the large bridged road gap over the Cross Country Course. A number of rock stepdowns leads over the 4 Cross Course into a hipped right hander into a small rock garden. A short pedal and the rider enters a large offcamber banked section which ends with a large rock garden. The DH Course joins the 4 Cross Course over a large step down for a short sprint into a 14m long right hip jump followed by a twin-lipped 13m long left hip into the final 13m fadeaway stepdown to the finish!

http://mpora.com/videos/hCfuXe62E
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