U.S. racers thrive in junior downhill as World Cup lands in North America

Juniors opened the downhill racing in West Virginia on Friday, with the next generation battling for podiums and overalls at the penultimate World Cup of 2023.

It was a rough day for Canadians, with crashes in and before racing, but two junior men did squeeze into the top 10.

Junior women

The junior women’s event saw two different races playing out: one for the win and one for the overall. Erice van Leuven, back from injury, would dominate the former. Commencal Les Orres’ Kiwi takes the win by 5.9 seconds in Snowshoe, looking confident and comfortable on the West Virginia tech.

Vn Leuven was joined by two Transition Factory Racing teammates. Taylor Ostgaard takes silver for a home U.S. crowd while Valentina Roa Sanchez takes bronze. That moves Roa Sanches further into the lead ahead of fourth place finisher, France’s Lisa Bouladou.

Junior Men: Pinkerton’s homecoming

A Heavy crash for Max Halchuck kicks off the Canadian effort in the junior men’s race. The Blueprint racer was slow to get up, after slamming into Snowshoe’s loose rocks, exiting the course with the help of the medical team.

Ryan Griffith (Pivot Factory Racing) put in very smooth run, floating through the janky rocks and onto the early hot seat. He was briefly joined by two more Canadians before they were all slowly pushed off the podium by a series of European racers.

Jon Mozell, Forbidden Synthesis’ medalist in Les Gets, looked fast before crashing right near the exit of the wildly awkward rock garden. Some mechanical difficulty added insult to what hopefully is not an injury from touching down, as the young Canuck appeared to struggle pedalling.

Dane Jewett added another fast time for Pivot Factory Racing. The B.C. racer absolutely sent it into the lower technical rock section to make up almost two seconds. It wasn’t quite enough for the hot seat, with Jewett going into second,  just 1 second off the lead with several riders left.

Clearly comfortable racing at home on U.S. soil, and on the sharp Snowshoe rocks, Evan Medcalf (Evolve Racing) looked to just cruise the top half of the run. The relaxed air was deceptive, as the U.S. racer was in touch before attacking the bottom section with abandon and, finally, throwing the pedals at it to move into the lead.

Bodhi Kuhn (Trek Factory Racing) started fast but it quickly appeared that a crash earlier in the week was holding the Rossland, B.C. racer back. It’s good to see Kuhn back on track after sitting out Les Gets with concussion symptoms but the Trek athlete will not likely be happy with watching his chance at reagining the overall lead slide away in Snowshoe.

It was Ryan Pinkerton (GT Continental) who took over the World Cup overall lead from Kuhn. The U.S. racer has been on a tear since and, after setting the fastest time in qualifying, was poised to seal the overall title with a good result in his home country. A reasonably clean run ended with a very smooth pre-hop off the final container drop and down to the finish line. Pinkerton takes the win while wearing the U.S. national champions’ sleeve, in front of a U.S. crowd. And, with that cements the UCI junior men’s title for 2023.

Evan Medcalf joins him on the podium. Mylann Falquet rounds out the podium in third.

Dane Jewett and Ryan Griffith put Canada and Pivot Factory Racing in the top 10, placing seventh and ninth. Bodhi Kuhn rolls in 12th, Zac Stratton 15th, Jon Mozell 18th, Ethan Donohoe 19th, Logan Chapman 20th while Max Halchuck did not finish his run after his heavy crash.