Relay

Spain Wins Team Relay
Worlds Well Underway
Sierra Nevada, Spain: June 7, 2000
[Results] [Race Schedule]

Worlds got underway Wednesday afternoon with the second running of the cross-country team relay with Spain taking gold for the second time in an impressive come-from-behind effort ahead of Switzerland and Italy.

Taking place on a difficult new XC track near the mountainside venue, the relay gave a good idea of what to expect in Sunday's big XC showdown — and gave the small Spanish crowd something to cheer about early in the week.

The relay is a new event to Worlds, introduced last season as a way to involve racers from all the XC disciplines and thus uses four national team members (obviously from different trade teams) to hopefully win the tag-team format. There are senior men, senior women, U-23 (under 23) men and junior men racing, in any order the national coach desires.

The incentive for competitors is the coveted rainbow jersey, cycling's biggest prize next to Olympic gold. Each member of the winning team gets the stripes, so competition is serious as riders go one lap each, then pull into a transition area, hand off an armband to a teammate - the race lasting four laps on the XC course.

	click

Wednesday's race saw three teams go out early, Canada, Italy and France. But Canada eventually fell back due to a derailleur problem in lap two, as did France in lap three. That left Italy and Switzerland, plus a surging Spain recovering from a chain problem at the start of the race and getting a lot of help from current World Champ Marga Fullana (ESP, Subaru-Specialized).

Coming into the fourth and final lap, Italy was in the lead, with champion Paola Pezzo (ITA, Gary Fisher Saab) waiting her turn as anchorperson. But Spain was only 1:30 back, and their anchorman was Jose Antonio Hermida (ESP, Bianchi Albacom). He hit his final lap with a vengeance, fueled by completely crazy Spanish fans, who had way too much energy for the hot weather.

Regardless, Hermida motored past Pezzo, as did Switzerland. That put Hermida at the finish first, with the Swiss and Italy rounding out the first podium of Worlds.

The American's Greg Randolph suffered severe wheel problems in the first lap, putting the USA at an insurmountable disadvantage and finishing 7th. The Canadians, who looked so strong early on, fared even worse and finished 12th.

—Ari Cheren, dealing as best he can with Sierra Nevada's concept of organization for MountainZone.com