Big disappointment for Brendan Fairclough right in the beginning of the season. After looking so good all practice with, no complaints at all about the flat section, he slipped a pedal after launching straight off one of the big rock drops, a fast line that no one else was doing, and came unglued in the rock garden landing tweaking his knee. Hanging it all out in qualifying is what he is about though, hopefully his hard off–season training will not be for nothing and we hope to see him at Fort William.

In the women’s there were no surprises with predicted favourite and 2009’s winner Tracy Moseley taking top spot almost six seconds clear of Floriane Pugin, who was fastest at the top and was looking most comfortable on the jumps. Tracy had been in South Africa racing the eight day Cape Epic XC stage race with Anka Martin and all those miles and training over the winter have definitely crossed over into a good base for the downhill season. With another full day for practice and recovery with intermittent rain finals was going to still be wide open.

The 4X course in Martizburg is also a fast affair. It is long and snakes its way down the same valley that the downhill finishes in, this leaves very little room for passing. Fast tracks seldom do. There were a few rhythm sections up near the top and one or two wider flattish turns but if you hadn’t done your passing after turn two it would be near impossible further down. Near impossible that is if Mother Nature, chance and luck didn’t exist. The red soil in this part of the world can compact nice and hard and make a good base for a track. But it also has a large clay content. There were daily showers and because the track sat in a steep sided valley parts of it did not see a lot of sun and so didn’t dry out properly. One section had a slight turn entering into a long off–camber downhill littered with rocks, the more you tried to avoid the rocks with the high line the more you had to ‘hop’ off and over the off–camber entry. So what do you do? Tyre choice for qualifying is one thing, as you need to roll as fast as possible with no worries about passing. But surely riders have to think differently when it comes to racing? Although with a track as fast as this I’m sure the only thing they are thinking about it rolling resistance. The double edged sword and often the downfall for many a 4X racer. Yet without fail in nearly every heat in both the men’s and women’s racing we saw unforced errors and crashes caused by tyre slippage on this deceiving surface. Would grippier tyres have been faster? Maybe not, but they sure as hell would of allowed you to finish a heat you were leading or running second in. It was actually comical how you could predict something happening and yet time and time again riders paid no heed to what was going on in previous rounds and heats and the same errors were made over and over again. Slavik, Rinderknecht and Molchik will all remember this one lesson. Come finals Anneke Beerten and Jared Graves were untouchable and finished where they qualified, comfortably ahead. Prokop had a great gate and stayed ahead of Fischbach who rode well all night, freshly recovered from a broken collarbone. Fionn Griffiths showed some power up top and her sprinting earned her surprise second place podium trophy. Her sprinting would serve her well in the downhill too, but nobody expected that or saw it coming.

Now what had the downhillers been up to. More importantly what had the mechanics managed to round up into their bag of tricks? Gee tried a few various renditions of cut semi slicks, but found that while the smooth middle rolled fast the outer treads still created drag on some of the stuff when the bike settled into the track. He went instead for his Ft William weapon, the Kaisers, pumped up nice and hard. They have raised centre blocks that are ramped and close enough together to create a fast rolling centre tread. The Athertons are now using Stans DH rims and will be running them tubeless year round with Continentals that they have been testing during the offseason. He was also on an adjustable seatpost. Minnaar tried the adjustable post then discarded it. Peat was loving his. Both Syndicate boys were on trimmed down Maxxis High Rollers in the front, a semi slick for Peat in the rear and another shaved down High Roller for Minnaar. Hill was on cut Specialized Butchers and Cedric his proto Panaracers that were a few races old by now.