The British Cycling MTB Cross-Country Series continues this Sunday with the second round at Wheal Maid Valley in Redruth, Cornwall.
Round one at Codham Park was dominated by international stars - Dutch rider Michiel van der Heijden winning the elite men’s race and Belgian national champion Githa Michiels triumphant in the elite women’s event.
Neither van der Heijden nor Michiels will start in Cornwall but there is a strong field that will aim to capitalise and score points in the overall standings.
Elite categories
A first-lap crash wrecked defending champion Grant Ferguson’s (BETCH.nl Superior Brentjens MTB Racing Team) ambitions in round one, the 19-year-old suffering a front wheel puncture and ending 18th.
But two weeks later the Scot delivered a career-best third with Great Britain at the UCI Mountain Bike World Cup in South Africa with an assured display.
Having opted to miss the second round of the world cup in Australia last weekend, Ferguson will hope to put his domestic campaign back on track after his Pietermaritzburg heroics.
Ferguson can look back to 2013 for inspiration, when he won at Wheal Maid Valley ahead of teammate Kenta Gallagher.
Gallagher’s opening world cup weekend in South Africa was cut short after sustaining a concussion at the start of the race. The 21-year-old was eighth at Codham Park.
Paul Oldham (Hope Factory Racing) is the highest-placed British rider in the overall standings, the experienced 36-year-old ending round one in fourth.
The ever-improving Steven James - seventh at Codham - and Iain Paton, 18th in his world cup debut in South Africa, will also be on the start line.
In the elite women’s race, British champion Lee Craigie (Cannondale Racing) is a notable absentee through illness, handing the initiative to Jessie Roberts who finished behind her in third in round one.
Twenty-three-old Roberts (Trek Bicycle Coventry) is joined by Kerry MacPhee (Rock and Road Cycles) who took fourth in Essex.
Great Britain’s Bethany Crumpton, Tracy Moseley (T-Mo Racing), Melanie Alexander (Contessa Scott Syncros) and Maxine Filby (Trek Bicycle Coventry), all of whom finished in the top ten in round one, add to a competitive field.
British junior champion Alice Barnes steps up to the elite category. The Great Britain rider missed round one but will make her 2014 series debut this weekend.
Junior categories
Dylan Kerfoot-Robson (Marsh Tracks Race Team) struck first in the junior men’s category, narrowly beating Mark McGuire (Team Bicycles) in a sprint at round one.
The two will meet again with Thomas Craig (Pioneer Scott Syncros), who suffered a last-lap puncture at Braintree, ensuring the top three will all be present.
Isla Short made an early statement in the junior women’s category with her margin of victory over five minutes in round one ahead of Amira Mellor (Paul Milnes Cycles).
Short spent the race in the top ten of the elite women and will aim for more of the same with all of the top five from round one returning.
The venue
The Wheal Maid Valley course is based in an old mining pit with the terrain rocky. The climbs are mostly on wide tracks with a rocky base and the descents a mixture of flowing fast singletrack and steep chutes and drops.
