Minnaar Makes Triumphant Return

Squidly Didly

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Greg Minnaar (Santa Cruz Syndicate), South Africa's most successful mountain bike racer ever, made a triumphant return to competition at the weekend after a long injury layoff to capture the National Downhill Title at the 2008 Mazda MTN South African Mountain Bike Championships.

A slightly stiff shouldered Minnaar lacked some of his usual fluidity, but was certainly not lacking any speed or class as he completed two virtually identical runs down the tricky 2.9km plunge through the forest at Cascades on the western slopes of his hometown, Pietermaritzburg.

The national championships event today was his first real taste of competition after having been back on the bike for only three weeks. The 26-year-old Minnaar underwent major surgery to repair his shoulder last October.

On his first run in wet conditions, Minnaar clocked a fast 4min 38.76secs to give him a substantial cushion over his rivals going into the second run. Only defending national champion, Andrew Neethling (Mongoose Red) was able to join Minnaar in breaking five minutes in the first round with a time of 4min 51.34secs.

Wind and sunshine ensured the course dried out substantially for the second round and Neethling's second run of 4min 41.03secs was almost 10 seconds quicker than his first, bringing him a lot closer to Minnaar's time and confirming his world-class pedigree. But Minnaar, was a model of consistency, clocking a fractionally quicker 4m 38.09secs to secure his first South African title since 2002 when he lasted contested it.

"To be honest, it was quite a relief to win today," smiled Minnaar. "I'm always expected to win in South Africa and when I'm home, I'm not super focused on racing so went into the race a bit under prepared. But it all worked out okay and my shoulder never bothered me at all, although I was a bit stiff from practising in the mud on Saturday."

Neethling's younger brother, Jonty, was significantly quicker on his second run, clocking 4m 51.51secs which was good enough to give him the bronze medal in one of the highest quality downhill fields ever assembled at a South African national championships.


Final Results:
1. Greg Minnaar (Santa Cruz Syndicate) 4m 38.09s
2. Andrew Neethling (Mongoose Red) 4m 41.03s
3. Jonty Neethling (Morewood Fox Oakley) 4m 51.51s
4. Johann Potgieter (Cannondale) 4m 55.83s
5. Wesley Augustyn (Mongoose) 5m 00.65s
6. Chris Nixon (Cannondale) 5m 03.62s
7. Travis Browning (Morewood) 5m 03.65s
8. Greg Saharin (Giant) 5m 09.12s


 

BLAKE-2234

Likes Bikes and Dirt
those 2 post make no sense to me^^^^^^????

minnar will pin this season fo sure on his new v10 read the article on the santa cruz site he likes his bike cause it has a trick paint job:p
 

d_j1

Likes Dirt
omfg since when is minnar been riding for santa cruz!!
Wow dude. Next I'll expect you to say something like "OMFG since when have bikes had two wheels!!??"
Seriously though, good to see him still pinning. It's gonna be a hell interesting year with all the teams collapses and changes.
 

tupper

Likes Bikes and Dirt
omfg since when is minnar been riding for santa cruz!!
OMFG since when have bikes had two wheels.
Those two quotes are very similar for anyone that doesn't know the tiniest bit interested in the biking world.

Minnaar + v10 = Speed (also another 6foot giant to the syndicate team.)

Ps. Still waiting for Mr. Minnaar to accept my facebook request!
 

andy73

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I reckon it's great seeing him on a Santa Cruz and good to see him back to his winning ways. Hope he can get his shoulder 100% and be a force on the DH circuit this year.
 

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Adamski

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Heck yes this year's gonna be gold, so many swaps. Lopes, Minnaar, Barel, Kovarik, Fairclough, Lehikonen....list goes on...lot of people trying to kick off on new bikes in good form. Be interesting to see who makes the best of it.
 

GeoffRidesBikes

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Heck yes this year's gonna be gold, so many swaps. Lopes, Minnaar, Barel, Kovarik, Fairclough, Lehikonen....list goes on...lot of people trying to kick off on new bikes in good form. Be interesting to see who makes the best of it.
Fairclough and Lehikonennenenenenen were forced into their change becuse G-Cross Honda went completely belly up. Kovarik is still on an Intense, just a different team (The CRC team as opposed to MS Intense). Im still shocked about Lopes TBH. Even more shocked he's on Ibis.

EDIT: Haha just reading the PinkBike link:
Random on PinkBike said:
o god, well at the world cups this year what they should do is, other then hill, just have the santa cruz team go and see who wins, save the time and effort from the others
 
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Jimmy401

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Wonder if the crazy south african knows how to use a "trigger shifter" he'd be like where the hell is my grip shift. and whats this xo thing attached to my frame.
 
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