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Peter Sagan current Road World Champion is riding today in the Olympic Games cross-country mountain bike race that starts this morning at 11:30 ET. He won the 2008 junior cross-country world title but that was 7 years ago. He’s riding against France's Julien Absalon, Switzerland's Nino Schurter and gold medallist from 2012, Jaroslav Kulhavý Czech Republic. Anyone think he has a shot at a podium position?

steppy

Pemetic2006

Thanks for posting this. I don't know anything about mountain biking but watching Sagan today should be fun.

Chicago Al 

That was really sad...he clearly had it, but the puncture killed his chances. It would have been really interesting--and entertaining, I'm sure--to see if he could have held his own with the top guys to the end. I was betting he could. Chapeau to Sagan for trying something very different!

dcsix

It was cool to see Sagan jump out quick, remember that he was seeded last-back row for him-since he didn't have any season points in MTB. I am sure that Schurter, who along with Absalon had been dismissive of his chances, was quite surprised to see Peter in 3rd position within about two minutes! I'm sure he was happy to see him go away, too. Anybody hear what caused him to flat a couple times? It was suggested by the commentators that a lack of experience was a possible reason, i.e. pressure wrong or hitting obstacles at bad angles.

Nice to see Sagan surprise the big boys if only for a lap.

RubeRad

I started a thread over in MTB forum about the olympic mtb racing that isn't gaining much traction...

As for Sagan, was rooting for him for sure, I can't decide whether Sagan had a real chance at a medal, or if he just blew his wad right up front, and the flats covered up that he wouldn't have been able to maintain the pace for all 7 laps. If you watched the women's race, there was a woman who was leading strong for like 2-3 laps, then she ran out of steam.

However, I was reading various stuff online, and I saw somebody make the interesting assertion that mtb is a much younger sport, with a much smaller talent pool than professional road cycling, so it would not be surprising that a top-flite road racer like Sagan (with plenty of mtb experience in his younger days) would have the skills and the fitness to blow away a field of mtb pros. I read somewhere that after the first flat, he had worked his way back up to 11th place and then got the 2nd flat.

Regardless, I wonder why were so many guys getting flats, not just Sagan. Don't these guys use sealant?

An interesting article

fietsbob

Peter at 35th was a Lap down, at the end..

It seems they were on 29ers..

RubeRad

I know, right? So much for the demise of the 29er, so many people were saying 27.5 was The Thing, my wife was afraid to buy a 29er, like she wouldn't be able to buy spare tubes or something