Report from Global Racing  
(0 comments) Tuesday, 9-September-2003  2:31 PM - by DOM 
Global Racing at The Worlds
Without a doubt, the highlight of this week for the Global Racing Team here in Lugano (SUI) for the World Championships was watching our good friend and former teammate win the prestigious title of World Champion. Greg Minnaar made us all very proud. He had stayed with us at the Maxxis Cup the week before and travelled to the Worlds with us, so we had a great time straight
after the win when he invited Global Racing to join Team Haro and go out for a celebratory dinner and everything else that followed.

For the three Global Racing riders the Worlds were a little disappointing. Andrew "Needles" Neethling developed a head cold during the week and after not qualifying as he would have liked in the 4X, decided to withdraw and save his energy for the Downhill. He had a great run going but just prior to the road gap, about a third of the way down the course, suffered a mechanical. His chainguide broke and he lost his chain and couldn't pedal the remainder of the course. Despite this, he finished a solid 28th, which we all feel should have been a top 20 without the mechanical, but it was one of those bizarre mechanicals that had never happened to us before. Andrew's skill level has developed dramatically this year and this is what kept his momentum up and resulted in a fast time on the testing track despite no drive chain.

Matti Lehikoinen had nothing to lose here and after qualifying 12th was in good reach of a top 10 result. Team instructions were to not ride conservatively, but to go for a top ten. If he crashed trying for a good time, then that would be better than hitting the brakes too much. Madi went for it, but unfortunately crashed hard. He was taken to hospital for an X-Ray to check for broken ribs as he was in a lot of pain and having trouble breathing. Fortunately he hasn't broken anything, but has bruised and torn the muscles that surround the ribs. He'll be fine for next week in Kaprun.

Lindsay Klein raced the junior category and after qualifying conservatively in 15th, also looked good for a top ten, but after his final run he said his arm pump was more severe today than any other, as the course was blown to bits. Lindsay finished in 17th about 30 seconds back from compatriot Sam Hill, but is now looking forward to racing Kaprun next week on a much shorter course.

A huge thanks to all the Global Racing fans that turned up this week to wish the boys well, and of course Greg, well done once again!

Martin Whiteley
Team Director
Global Racing
mailto:captain23@23degrees-sports.com
www.ARAIglobal.com


Source - Rock from dhrace.com forum





All content copyright 2003-2004 The Farkin Crew. All rights reserved. No reproduction allowed without written permission. Farkin is a registered trademark of Rotorburn. ABN: 38 951 849 043