Graves and King win Australian cross country series opener

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Jared Graves and Jenni King have won the cross country mountain bike races at the first round of the Subaru Australian National Mountain Bike Season in Adelaide.

Riders faced a challenging course while completing laps of the Eagle Mountain Bike Park cross country course in Adelaide's hills in hot and windy weather.

Men

In the elite men's race, the simple version of the story is that Graves led from start to finish. Things were far more complex than that, however.

Graves, who is known for his ability to ride at an elite level in almost any cycling discipline, was four cross world champion in 2009 and is regularly on the world podium in both the downhill and enduro disciplines.

Graves started strongly in the day's race, with a close chasing group of Cameron Ivory, Brendan Johnston and Michael Crosbie at the end of the first lap.

During lap 2, Graves' forks collapsed, and to the amazement of all, he kept riding strongly. On the same lap, Crosbie made a passing move up to second place, and was made aware by spectators that the leading Graves was hampered due to his bike problems, and while he tried, he couldn't quite chase down the powerful Graves.

Graves talked about his mechanical issue. "It caused my arms to be more tired than my legs, I could barely hold on," he said.

The race was his first cross country national series round win since being a junior 13 years ago. Graves was happy with the result, and other cross country riders may need to be on the lookout for some even stronger performances.

"I've had 12 months of solid aerobic training, and I'm looking to build on this some more even," said Graves.

Women

In the elite women's race, Tori Thomas, Jenni King and Peta Mullens dominated the field throughout.

Thomas led the race for the first five laps, with Mullens sitting tight behind in second.

Thomas, who would ultimately finish second, said, "I was pleased to be mixing it up at the front, I had a pretty good lead at one stage but then I had a problem on a descent, but I'm really happy with today's result."

Eventual winner King was happy to sit in third place for much of the race. "I went out fairly hard and then settled into a rhythm. I actually thought that I went out too hard and that's why I backed off a fair bit."

King made her move on the second-last lap and managed to hold off Thomas in a sprint finish. "I thought with two laps to go, I'm going to give it everything and really worked the descents and the little punchy hills."

One more race to go for the weekend

Round 1 of the series will conclude on Sunday with the downhill.

Danielle Beecroft had the fastest downhill qualifying time (2:34.06) for the elite women in her first official race in the category after stepping up from juniors. "I was pretty happy, I just cruised down and had some fun and I'll see how I go tomorrow," she said.

In the elite men's downhill  seeding, local Connor Fearon led the field with the fastest overall time (2:02.87) of the day. "It was pretty slippery, I think the key was to keep your speed consistent and not try too hard."

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