Most of you reading this would know that the MTB World Champs were held in Italy last week. For me it was my 2nd race for the year back on the mountainbike, and with my 1st race back bringing me a world cup win in Fort William Confidence was high!

We had heard reports that the weather was meant to be rainy and cold all week, which is how it was when we arrived on Tuesday, but from Wednesday onwards there was nothing but sunshine and warm (sometimes hot!) weather, which was great.

The DH course was rooted and very technical, everyone was saying how hard it was, and tough to get down the hill without crashing, but over the first couple days the sun dried it out and things got a little easier. My team mates, Justin and Sam were pinned during practice, and were both on it big time! Justin Qualified 3rd and Sam 5th, it was going to be pretty exciting watching them in the final on Saturday! I was happy they qualified close together and at the pointy end because 4X finals were right after DH so I didnt have to spend all day sitting in the sun to cheer on my teammates! I Just cruised over to see the last 10 guys come down!

Unfortunately Sam had some issues and finished a bit down the order, but everyone knows he's one of the top up and coming pinners! Justin laid down a solid run that he was pretty happy with for 6th! Knowing how hard it is to get top 10 at world champs I was super happy for Juzzo! He trains so hard and wanted a good result so bad, so for him to get it was awesome!

Sam Hill was once again hauling! Watching his run was something else, Ive never seen anyone hold it that wide open and seemingly take that many risks, amazing to watch! but unfortunately he came unstuck on the 2nd last corner (with all the hard stuff out of the way) remounted, lost MASSES of time and still came in 3rd....crazy!

Steve Peat was in the hot seat at the time, and when Sam went down i thought Peatys bad luck from Les Gets worlds when he crashed on the 2nd last turn with the win wrapped up was coming back to him, in what you could only describe as a fairy tale! But Gee Therton was the fastest qualifyer and was still up on the hill, and had a killer run to knock Peaty from the top spot.

I saw Peaty after the race and I honestly didnt know what to say to him, he has had so many 2nd place finishes at world champs, I really wanted him to win, as I do every year, just because I think he deserves to win atleast 1 rainbow jersey more than anyone.

But well done to Gee, another cool guy, it was cool to see him get the win as well, and to add that to his sisters win in the womens DH, the Atherton clan must have been pretty happy.

On that note though I have to give a special mention to Dan Atherton, who after training with him all the week before, he was pretty motivated for a good world champs himself, and had been riding so good. BUT broke his collarbone on Tuesday in DH practice. I was so bummed for him! Get well Danimal!

Onto the 4X.

Ill keep it short as I dont really feel like talking much about it even now ( almost a week after) Coming off the win in Fort William I was more confident of winning any race than I had ever been. It was the 1st race I have ever done I think, where I knew exactly what I had to do to win, and how to do it, I did'nt have any doubts about anything, I just wanted to get stuck into racing and do my thing.

All week I was feeling really ready and confident, and once practice got underway I felt even better about things. I had a solid qualifying run and qualified 1st, so I couldnt have asked for more there, and by race time I was totally ready to go!

I had a very comfortable round of 64, 32, 16 and semi final, and before I knew it it was time for the main event.

My gates were on all day, and I just knew when I was in the gate that as long as nobody pulled any dickhead moves in behind me I would win. It was a strange feeling, but I was'nt trying to get ahead of myself, I was taking everything 1 pedal at a time.

The gate dropped and I got a comfortable holeshot, I swung out a little bit to get a slightly wider run into turn 1 to set myself up for better exit speed. When i started seeing Michael Deldycke sliding up the inside.....I could'nt beleive it! As soon as I saw him I knew how it was going to end up, that move was never going to stick and he wiped himself and Roger Rinderknecht out in the process.

To say the least I was very dissapointed in him, I really thought with all his experince he would know better, from trying that line about 4 times in practice myself, I knew the tight fast inside line passing move couldnt be stuck cleanly. I guess noone told him that!

In Deldyckes defence though, it is the World champs final, and he has won a bunch of medals himself at this event, but never Gold, so that situation brings out some interesting situations, and make people do some things they normally would'nt.

So from there Rafa Alvarez went on and had a cruisy lap all to himself to claim the rainbows. He was riding really solid all week, and I was really impresed with how he has come along in the past 12 months, you could see in practice he was going to qualify well, and he put it in 3rd in qualifying, so he was deserving of a good result.

Was also great to see Melissa Buhl take the womems win, shes been at this game for ages now, so it must feel great to get that title!

Also, Michal Prokop broke his collarbone during practice, and with the olympics coming up I hope he heals well, It would suck for him to miss out after coming this far and pretty much single handedly qualifying his country for the games.

For me, well, in racing you have the good and the bad, I have had a really good run of good so far this year, but the feeling I had after the race was as low as they get. But its all part of the game. I felt so confident all night, with the world Champions jersey being my biggest goal in mountainbike racing and feeling like I have been robbed of it once again, it will only make me better. Ill be back doing the Full World Cup curcuit next season, and ill be even more ready for those races than I am now!

At the moment In back at the Yeti factory in Colorado. Getting all my new BMX stuff together and doing a little bit of training, just freshening up to smash myself for the next 6 weeks training for the Olympics! I leave for San Diego tomorrow for a 3 week team camp on the replica track there, so that will be awesome!

I feel great at this stage and I know that with another 6 weeks of the right training and preparation ill be totally 100% to give it my best for Australia! and hopefully walk away with a medal for my efforts!

All for now

Jared