Jurgen Beneke in the April issue of Mountain Bike

[jbogner]

Was just reading the story about the Beneke vs. Mark Weir rivalry at the Downieville Classic DH race in Mountain Bike magazine. Good stuff. Beneke pulled off 4th place, only a minute down on Weir over 5000 feet of descending and 500 feet of climbing and race times of 40+ minutes. This, despite the fact that Weir has been racing and winning Downieville for over a decade, trains there frequently, and knows the course like the back of his hand. On a neutral course, the outcome could have been much different.

Regardless, there's a nice east coast/west coast thing brewing... ;)

[dirttastesgood]

On anything with a large amount of endurance Weir will win hands down. That man is nuts. I don't think he still has what it takes to do well in a 3 minute DH but in anything over 20 minutes he will win.

[Jim Mac]

Dude lives an hour south of me, should see where he does his xc rides, as mentioned in the article! I watched him at the October Platty race while he hit the wallride on his race run and rocketed out faster than he came in! He was quoted as say (add your German accent here: ) "The G-forces were amazing..."

[douglas]

JB has decent endurance too.
I entered an XC race at Platty, Beneke did it too - he got 2nd to the dude thats probably the fastest XC'er in NY.

I think I heard his wife/GF say "He's a world champion" about 110 times that day...OK, honey we heard you the first 109 times :twitch:

[Jim Mac]

Well Doug, it's true! :busted:

[jbogner]

On anything with a large amount of endurance Weir will win hands down. That man is nuts. I don't think he still has what it takes to do well in a 3 minute DH but in anything over 20 minutes he will win.

I think your opinion is based on a carefully crafted public image that Weir has created for himself, but not necessarily on reality. Whenever Weir goes up against real competition, he doesn't win, and that's not good for his public image, so he sticks to the smaller homespun events.

As fun as the rivalry may be, both Beneke and Weir should be glad that Adam Craig's gunning for a spot on the Olympic team, and can't afford to take time out to race Downieville. If he were to finally show up, he would take *his* east coast skills (born and raised in Maine) and put the hurt on all of 'em. According to this Velonews interview, (http://www.velonews.com/article/12393) he's looking to do that in 2009. It wouldn't be the first time Craig beat Weir in a Super-D. ;)