As the Tissot-UCI Mountain Bike World Cup marked its halfway point with a spring break at last week's World Championships in Spain, an unlikely turn of events has the industry questioning, "Why is the cross-country series a hotter ticket than the downhill?" Common wisdom has, for several seasons, held that of the two World Cup disciplines — cross-country and downhill/dual — it is the gravity-fed downhill that is the more popular of the two and the crowd pleaser of the racing circuit. But with attendance at the first five cross-country events grossly outnumbering the first three downhill/dual races, journalists and team members are remarking at the cross-country revival of late.

The cross-country series began its season with a well-attended race in Napa Valley, before heading down south to Mexico for a race in Mazatlan. It then spent three weeks in Belgium, Germany and Italy before breaking for Worlds. At each of the European venues, crowds numbered in the tens of thousands — especially in Houffalize, Belgium where police are often at a loss to count the actual number of spectators in the remote wooded sections.

The downhill circuit, in contrast, has seen disappointing crowds in all three of its European events in France, Italy and Slovenia. In Les Gets, France for example, crowds were noticeably smaller than in years past, while in the Italian stop of Cortina there were only several thousand spectators at best. Slovenia's crowds were similar to last years, with perhaps 10,000 people on hand just outside the country's second-largest city, Maribor.

Suggested reasons for this discrepancy are varied. One put forth is the pending Olympic games, which features cross-country racing. With many national federations naming their teams and increased press attention to September's race in Sydney, public interest in the cross-country discipline is predictably at a four-year high as the sport steps into the limelight for such an important race.

Another reason for the spectator discrepancy is location, location, location. Where cross-country races are all centered around town centers at lower altitudes near large populations, downhill racing needs ski lifts — and that means the races take place at more remote mountain ski resorts. The result is that it's easier for fans to attend a cross-country race than a downhill.

Cortina's downhill race, for example, was staged during the mountain resort town's off-season, when the small tourist region is typically devoid of people. Houffalize, in contrast, has a built in population — one that had just watched a major road race the week before.

The next World Cup race is in Mont Sainte-Anne, and is a triple event with cross-country, downhill and dual racing — the only race of its type this season. From there the two series split up again as the cross-country tour goes to Calgary and the finals in Switzerland, while the downhill series heads to Vail and Japan before ending the season at a separate Swiss venue. Next season will see five triple events, helping both series attain more spectators and the continued growth of the sport.

—Ari Cheren, MountainZone.com Correspondent