During the first weekend in May 2009, Houffalize (BEL) will experience a big premiere: In addition to hosting its traditional Olympic cross-country race, the town in the Luxembourg Ardennes will also organize a four-cross World Cup event. This will be the first “double” cross-country and 4X World Cup leg to be held in Belgium.
The host town in the Ardennes has pulled out all the stops to provide an international standard 4X course designed by the British specialist Phil Saxena. This spectacular 450 meters long course, with a difference in altitude of 120 meters, was officially opened on April 19th 2008, on the occasion of a UCI Class 1 event. The first winners on the new course were the Dutch Joost Wichman (Elite Men) and the Austrian Anita Molcik (Elite Women).
This new World Cup event will certainly attract a big crowd to the Belgian MTB “Mecca”, with a final scheduled on the evening of Saturday May 2nd.
Voted six times “best XCO World Cup”, Houffalize will organise the second round of the cross-country Olympic World Cup the same weekend: both in the Juniors categories competing in their first official “World Cup” and in the Under 23 and Elite categories.
One of the international circuit’s most appreciated courses, both by the riders and by the public (20’000 spectators on average), Houffalize, provides a mixture of hard climbs and wearing descents. This year, it will remain loyal to its well-known passages, the Fosse d’Outh and the Arsenal, which have helped forge Houffalize’s reputation among mountain bike specialists and fans both in Belgium and abroad.
An event as mythical to mountain biking as Liège-Bastogne-Liège is to road cycling, this competition in the “Hautes Ardennes” boasts a prize-list that includes some of the biggest names in the discipline: From the American John Tomac, winner in 1992, to Christophe Sauser passing by Djernies, Dupouey, Martinez, Meirhaeghe, Green, Paulissen, Hermida and of course the double Olympic Champion Julien Absalon who finally won in Houffalize in 2008.
The record books are equally impressive in the Women’s category, with the successes of Ballantyne, Sydor, Furtado, Pezzo, Fullana, Dahle and the Chinese Chengyaun, winner in 2007 and 2008.
This double event at the beginning of May will without a doubt once again transform Burgomaster Gérard Otto’s town into the MTB capital of the world. It is a meeting equally appreciated by the media: more then 200 were present at last year’s World Cup in Houffalize.
Home
Road