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Atherton closes Crankworx with DH win

Canadian Open wraps festival schedule
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Nine days of Crankworx mountain bike competition wrapped up on Sunday, Aug. 15 with the Canadian Open Downhill, a traditional World-Cup-style event that was both technical and physically demanding from top to bottom.

The course was almost the same as 2009, comprised of upper Joyride, a section of Schleyer, a section of trail under the Fitzsimmons Chair, then back to Joyride and across the flats to Monkey Hands. A new park feature was also built at the finish line.

World Cup star Gee Atherton showed why he's one of the best in the world with a time of 3:04.14 in the Pro Men's category. Atherton, who won the Aug. 7 dual slalom, was over five seconds faster than Lewis Buchanan of Scotland, who finished in a time of 3:09.16. Justin Leov of New Zealand was a close third in 3:09.20.

The top Canadian was Whistler's Tyler Morlan, in eighth place.

Emmeline Ragot of France took the Pro Women's race in 3:37.78, followed by Whistler's Claire Buchar in 3:43.12 and Squamish's Miranda Miller in 3:46.85.

Brennan Walstrom added another win to his collection in the Boy 13 to 15 competition, finishing in 3:25.07 - close to 10 seconds ahead of Whistler's Alexander Geddes (3:34.86). Jackson Lee was third in 3:37.02, followed by Cole Swanson in 3:39.33 and Jack Iles in 3:51.72.

Australian Connor Fearon squeaked out a win in the Junior Men 16 to 18 in 3:15.49, followed by B.C. Team rider Remi Gauvin in 3:16.21. Whistler's Tyler Allison was a close third out of 52 riders in 3:16.96. Rounding out the top 10 were Harrison Dusbury-Sleep, Nick Grimm, Max Horner, Cameron Porteous, Sam Powers and Ollie Gregory-Jones.

Bridgette Leber was the only junior female in the race, finishing in 7:42.87.

Mathieu Herbert won the Master Men 30-plus category in 3:42.49, followed by Andrew Gunn in 3:43.81 and Bob Jones in 3:44.71. Also in the top five out of 20 racers were Mike Stewart and Martin Raffo.

Taylor Joseph won the Senior Men 19 to 29 group in 3:21.93, followed by Chris Gray in 3:23.28 and Jeremias Malo in 3:25.42. Kris Atkinson and Nicholas were fourth and fifth.

Shelly Flood won the Senior Women 19-plus group in 4:18.06, followed by Jess Lathrop and James Nickey.

Complete results are posted online at www.crankworx.com.