An amazing night of 4X racing finishes with a BANG.
It started off as a slow burner but ended up with fireworks. Joey Gough was so, so close to taking the win in the women’s 4X. She led out the field in the final from the start, but as she came into the rock garden section at the end of the third straight she kind of got herself in a bit of a tangle on ‘that rock’ (as Buhl). It was enough to let Anneke Beerten through to take the win (her first win here in Fort William), and she will be the first to tell you that she got lucky. Gough managed to hold it together for a very creditable second place, but oh what could have been.
In the men’s the Scott Roberts flew the flag for Great Britain but didn’t manage to make it past the last 16. A great result for the young rider though. Then the shock of the night came when current World Cup leader Jared Graves messed up and didn’t make it through to the final. He did go on to win the small (losers’) final. The last four was made up of Joost Wichman, Tomas Slavik, David Graff and Roger Rinderknecht. Current World Champion Slavik was favourite but it was Wichman that got the snap and led everyone out. Disaster struck though as Wichman went over the bars on the rocks, destroying any chances of the win.
Riders were flying everywhere, so much so that I can’t really remember what happened…ha. But it was Rinderknecht that pulled off the win ahead of Graff. It was a few minutes later that Slavik and Wichman rolled over the line.
We should maybe question Graves’ semi final gate choice but Rinderknecht was a very worthy winner. And we should also point out that were a ton of punctures during racing, Fionn Griffiths being punished the most.
