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The Sarsha Huntington crash sequence
There were only four more runs: the small and big finals for the men and the women. First the women's small final took place, the ran for the 5-8th places. By the time they got to my position, Australian rider Sarsha Huntington let the field.
When she started the last jump of the section, everything seemed to be fine. The landing, however, didn't happen as she probably planned it. I am reluctant to call this luck as she clearly hurt herself badly in the accident but I happened to be in the right place in the right time. Here is the chronicle of her crash.
At this point, it seemed all was well...
... the landing, however, wasn't that smooth.
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UCI MTB World Cup 2010: 4X finals in Fort William, UK
Not long after the downhill qualifiers, the 4X finals took place. It started at 6pm, the dusk started to settle in but we still had plenty of light - it didn't really make sense to use strobes, at least not extensively.
It was pretty straighforward, Jana Horakova and Jared Graves bagged another win and increased their lead in the overall World Cup standings. There was an ugly crash, right in front of my lens in the small final of the women, more on that tomorrow.
Jared Graves
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4X - and the weather is still horrible
Just a quick post with the photos from yesterday's 4X race. I ran out of batteries by the end of the day (how unprofessional), so I finished the day early.
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Arrived in Maribor
After a moderately long flight and a definitely way too long train ride (almost three hours to cover 127 kilometers), I arrived in Maribor last night. The weather was nice but it all changed overnight. Now it's pissing down so it will be a challenging day - both for the riders and for us.
I'm heading out to the course now, in the meantime, check out the photos from 2007 - my first visit to Maribor.
Houffalize 4X World Cup photos
Yesterday I couldn't post any photos of the 4X race due to the fact that the internet was down at the press center. Also, the event finished around 11pm, so given that I had got up at 4:30am yesterday and therefore had a really long and taxing day, I decided to head to the hotel.
It was in Luxemburg, which sounds like a different country and it probably is but I haven't seen any sign of it whatsoever. The hotel was nice, the owner's wife was really nice and even invited to have drink in the bar but all I wanted was a quick shower and as much sleep as I could get.
The morning was a bit tricky with the hosts still being asleep and the doors being locked but a smart fellow, who also wanted to get out of the building, pointed to the spare key above the door.
Anyway, here are the photos from yesterday, without further ado. I'm off to check to course out will post some photos from the women's race just after lunch. Stay tuned.
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4X race
I started at the lower part of the course, in a 180 degree turn. I got the shot I was looking for almost exactly, but I wanted more.
I figured that if I waited a little longer, it gets darker and a fill flash might spice things up a bit. I positioned the flash by the end of the turn, filling the outer edge of the racers. After a few shots these turned out pretty well, as well.
Having made these shots for almost 30 minutes, I got bored and went just a little bit further down the track. I placed the flash after a jump and I was trying to catch the pre-landing moments. It turned out pretty well quite soon, but within a few minutes, I realized that I`d made a huge mistake: didn`t pack a second battery for my 1D, I left it in the car. I didn`t expect the operating one to die but the first rule of the apt sports photographer is that NEVER EVER assume that your batteries would hold out as long as you`d need them to hold out. So I put the long lens onto the 5D which had enough juice in it but the autofocus wasn`t working as well as it would have on the 1D. It resulted in a lot of out-of-focus pictures, which can be really annoying.
A little later, I went even further down and found a nice spot. I put the flash on the right side of the camera, about 15 feet away. As the natural light was slowly slipping away, I started to see the pictures I had had in my mind. They were about to start the semi-finals but then brought a dilemma: should I stay for the rest of races and I`d have good pictures for sure or should I try to find a new spot, should I look for a new angle for the last few runs?
I decided to give it a shot - and it didn`t work out. During the last two runs I was trying to "get it" but I just couldn`t. Either I was lame or the angle wasn`t a good one, to start with, but I didn`t manage to come away with one decent shot of the last three (final) runs. This shot is ok-ish at best, though I like the beam of light on Dan Atherthon`s head.
By the time everything finished, it got pitch dark AND very cold, though a spectacular fireworks made our way back to the press center a tad more bearable.
