Siemens Mobile Snow King

Garmisch, Germany, February 23, 2003

Results

Vasquez tears the field and his butt apart

By Martin Whiteley, Global Racing

Today on the icy slopes in Garmisch, Germany, immediately after Marco Buechel of Liechtenstein won the FIS Super G World Cup, 15 of some of the world's best mountain bikers took to the slopes and raced in the inaugural Siemens Mobile Snow King event.

Broadcast live on the German national network ARD and shown to many more countries around the world, the Snow King is essentially a massed start downhill on the 2.8km FIS Super G World Cup course, descending 700m to the finish. Riders used tyres with spikes and chased 10,000 Euros in prize money.

Winning the race today was David Vasquez of Spain, closely followed by Oscar Saiz (also of Spain) who ripped the rear out of his trousers and large chunks of flesh as he accidentally sat on his studded rear tyre mid race, landing a jump.

Matti Lehikoinen of Finland (Global Racing) was in second place until the last corner where he ran wide under pressure, where the bleeding Saiz as well as top 4X rider Guido Tschugg passed him. Matti managed to hold off the fast finishing Cedric Gracia (Fra) to finish 4th. The star studded field also included Bas De Bever (Ned), Mickael Deldycke (Fra), Mickael Pascal (Fra), and Claudio Caluori (Sui).

Riders had no chance to pre-ride the course, but were permitted a walking or skiing inspection earlier in the day. Some super fast jumps and the massed start meant that riders were keen to get to the front early, as was Matti's plan, and all used metal spiked tyres. Matti's tyres each had 335 three millimeter spikes.

"There was a big crash early on involving a few riders so I am happy I was out front early. There was some really sick jumps and the course was so fast you couldn't pedal anymore towards the end. I really like this style of racing, but I'm pretty bummed I ran wide on the last corner, but top 5 was the goal so I gotta be happy", said a happy Matti from Munich tonight.

"Oscar's butt looked like a tiger had taken a pretty good hit at him!"

Results

1 David Vasquez
2 Oscar Saiz
3 Guido Tschugg
4 Matti Lehikoinen
5 Cedric Gracia