The third round featured five not too long, but quite challenging stages, a dominated women’s race and a very tight men’s race.
The third race of the Slovenian Cup season in the endurance and technical mountain biking discipline of enduro on the trails of the Cilenca trails park in Zagorje ob Savi in central Slovenia saw this year’s strongest field in the men’s long course race, as the national champion Vid Peršak returned. It was also the most evenly contested race and the most exciting and closest race in recent memory.
Until Friday, the trails above Evropark near Zagorje were soaked by rain, so the new Ragnarock track was unfortunately cancelled. On the long course the riders repeated the third special stage on the Jumanji course (also Shimano SuperStage) so that the race still had five stages and the elevation difference remained almost the same with about 1050 vertical metres.
The organisers from the Zagorska dolina Cycling Club carried out their third race with flying colours. After last year’s SloEnduro Day at this venue, it was the right decision to return the race to Zagorje.
Nežka Still Racing at Full Speed
It wasn’t a very close women’s race though. Nežka Libnik (KK Ravne na Koroškem) reigned supreme a week after her first World Cup junior win. After convincing victories in Nova Gorica and Ilirska Bistrica, she again won all the stages from the first to the last and in the end won with a good one minute advantage over this year’s “eternal second” Slovak Valentina Grendova (MTBiker). Third was Neža Štern (MTB club Kranj) over two minutes behind.
In the series standings Nežka has all 1200 points that could be won in three races, followed by Grandova with 900 points and Štern in third with 650 points.
Nežka Libnik on the fact that she has almost no competition at home, that maybe she doesn’t need to take many risks and where she will be next weekend.
“There is still competition, I still have to ride all the stages. If I tactically attack less, I can never be sure I’m fast enough. Maybe I need to get that feeling with experience. Next week is my home downhill race, I had to give it priority over the enduro World Cup.”
A Duel Between Young Hungarian and Experienced Slovenian
This time in the men’s overall classification of the long four leading riders changed positions from stage to stage. Unlike the SloEnduro Borovci four weeks ago, there was only one junior among them and, just like in Ilirska Bistrica, he was on the top step of the podium. Hungarian Áron Babó (Rad Company Racing Team), already last year’s fastest junior in the series, won the first stage at Stara Cilenca, but then slipped to third place in the second stage on the Forest Bump flow trail with a fifth place time. The stage was won by the Slovenian champion and last year’s overall SloEnduro winner Vid Peršak (AON Racing – Tourne Campervans), who had waited a long time for a new team bike and only started the season with the World Cup so he missed the first two SloEnduro races. The lead was taken by the second-placed Slovak Luboš Staňo (MTBiker), the winner of Nova Gorica. Staňo also won the third stage, Vid was second. Then Staňo had a troubled fourth stage and slipped to 4th place. Babó won the stage ahead of Peršak, who took the lead before the last stage, the return to Jumanji. Peršak went into the last stage with 1.95 advantage over Babó, so there was no room for tactics.
Staňo won the battle in the jungle of Jumanji, but it didn’t help him much. Babó was right behind him, then the second Slovak Maroš Krupa (MTBiker), who consolidated his third place, and then Peršak, who lost all his advantage over the Hungarian. Babó won his second victory of the year by 17 hundredths of a second after 13 minutes of racing. Peršak finished second, Krupa third, Staňo fourth and Austria’s Max Fejer (Team Dorrong), the 2019 SloEnduro champion, fifth place, which he overtook in the third stage after a poor start.
Babó and Staňo have the same number of points after two races, with the Hungarian now bouncing to lead with 1100 points, the Slovak is second on 920. Behind them the others are successfully stealing points from each other, so that in third place we find junior Ian Laharnar (Kamplc Racing Team), 10th this time, which was enough to climb from fifth. Italian Simone Leo (Gencon) missed the race and slipped from third to fifth, while Miha Smrdel (MBK Črni Vrh), with an incident and a broken handlebar, finished 19th but defended his fourth place in the overall standings.
Áron Babó on what made the difference in this race of twists and turns.
“The first stage suited me very well so I took the lead. The flow on the second one didn’t suit me, I didn’t have the rhythm. Then in the third one I made some mistakes. In the end, when we went for the second time on this stage, I was mentally more prepared for it than the first time.”
Vid Peršak on his day, today he is on his way to the World Cup in France.
“It was a good day. It was a great race, I really enjoyed the stages. I didn’t pay too much attention to the times, I only found out at the end what the situation was. First of all I wanted to still do some work on the bike, we had some problems with the drivetrain. It is obviously working now, that is very positive. Everybody was very fast, I had to push. I rode relatively well, the worst was in fourth, I had a couple of trips off track there and a close encounter with a photographer, but in the end it was really a very small difference. Áron deservedly did it.”
In Long Course Categories
In the overall long course classification, there were still five juniors among the fastest ten, but the rest stayed a little behind the winner, with juniors taking places from 7th down to 13th. Jakob Lorber (Golovec Trails) had a dream race, 42 seconds behind Babó and his best ever placing with second place among the juniors. Third place went to Tian Pečnik (KK Ravne na Koroškem), the third junior of last season, who has had no luck this year yet. Maks Struna (KK Završnica), third from Borovci, missed the race for a downhill race in Germany.
By far the fastest veteran was again Nejc Huth (Energijatean.com) from the master 1 category in 15th place overall. The master 2 category was won by Austrian Walter Ziedler (Do-Bike Bruck) and the master 3 category by Branko Maček (ŠKK Pendalna) for the second time in a row. Matija Šinigoj (Deš Fleš) won the amateurs category, and in the e-bike category, local Jure Saviozzi (MTB Trbovlje) turned the race in his favour in the last stage, the “power stage” lap, after Jan Modrijan (ŠKD Super Potential) had led the whole race.
On Shorter Courses
In the U17 juniors, 50 riders started and Ažbe Bizjan (Golovec Trails) won his first victory by 1.6 seconds ahead of Niko Potočan (KK Ravne) in second place and 4.8 seconds ahead of Italian Davide Zinutti (AB SantaCruz Vittoria Team) in third place. Bizjan’s victory moved him into third place in the standings, with Lenart Sever (KK Črn trn) and Hungary’s Matyas Csizmazia (Vesc Cycling Team) staying at the top, this time in 7th and 5th place respectively.
There were three junior women at the start, with Romanian Irina Marie (CS La Hoya) winning ahead of Lana Kuzma (KK Črn trn) and Zoya Bizjak (Kamplc Racing Team).
Rene Kovač (Kamplc Racing Team) won the U15 category with a good lead over his clubmate Tjaž Stres and Nikolaj Vukojević (Golovec Trails). A similar order is at the top of the standings in this category, only the Kamplc riders are swapped.
Three girls competed in this age category as well, with cross-country rider Maša Gregorc (SD Strahovica) winning her first enduro race ahead of Eva Podvornik (ŠD Grabit) and Gaja Šuštar (Golovec trails).
On the same course, the 4Fun category race was won by Máté Simon from Hungary.
Among the youngest competitors, under 13 years old, who competed in two stages, we had the third winner of the year in the boys’ category: Tin Adam (427 Savage Squad). In the girls’ category, only his clubmate Lija Leber tackled the course.
All results
All series standings
See You in Gorjanci
In just two weeks, on 7 and 8 June, the fourth round of the SloEnduro Gorjanci, the Dolenjska classic, will take place. This will be the fifth edition of the race organised by KD Zverinice, last year we awarded the national championship titles here. Entries are open until Monday, 2 June.
Propositions and registration for SloEnduro Gorjanci
Photos Matej Lovrič / Obalna BIKE scena
Fotografije Matej Lovrič / Obalna BIKE scena
