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Val Di Sole, Italy

 The United States National Team was hoping to repeat last year’s medal winning performance in the Team Relay competition on opening day of the Mountain Bike World Championships, but fell short in the 2008 edition, finishing eighth. 
 
The foursome of Georgia Gould (Fort Collins, CO), John Bennett (El Cerrito, CA), Sam Jurekovic (Jackson Hole, WY) and Adam Craig (Bend, OR) worked as a tag team to tackle the rain soaked course in the Italian Alps.
 
The Team Relay, features four laps of the cross-country circuit, one each contested by an elite male, elite female, U23 male and junior male from each nation. The team’s bronze-medal-winning performance in 2007 was the United States’ best showing since the event was added to the World Championship program in Are, Sweden in 1999.
 
With teams allowed to determine the start order of its representatives, the U.S. squad once again chose to open with Gould as they did for last year's great showing. Slovakia was the only other nation that did not opt to start with either its elite or U23 male competitor. Fittingly, the U.S. completed the first lap in 19th-place with Gould besting the Slovakian junior and putting the U.S. squad 4:48 behind the leading French whose Jean-Christophe Peraud completed the first lap in 19:55. Gould’s lap time of 24:43 was the sixth fastest amongst the elite women.
 
Bennett, the U.S. squad’s junior male entry, took the handoff from Gould and moved the U.S. up two spots to 17th place at the contest’s midway point. Bennett rode a 24:33 which ranked 16th amongst all riders on the second leg of the relay.
 
“I got in last night and was able to preride the course briefly, but with all the rain it has changed a lot, even since then,” Bennett explained. “It was oil-slick muddy, but a lot of fun. Not having the full pressure of a race on one person is really different from what I’m used to, but that really makes it a good time.”
 
National Development Team rider Jurekovic took over on the third lap and was able to make up a several spots, but after 75 percent of the race was over, the U.S. team still sat in 13th place.
 
This year, Craig, the elite male rider, was tasked with making up double the amount of spots as he did in 2007 in order to place the U.S. on the medal stand. Ironically he was able to move up only five spots, passing the exact same number of riders as he did last year in Fort William. This time, unfortunately, it landed the U.S. squad in eighth place overall.
 
The American team completed the event with an overall time of 1:30:12, which was 5:27:52 off the pace of the gold-medal-winning French squad. Craig out sprinted Alexander Wetterhall of Sweden to the line to take eighth place for the U.S. by only hundredths of a second. The Swiss team won a the silver medal by less than a second with a last minute kick by Nino Schurter leaving the Italians with a bronze medal on their home turf.
 
The come-from-behind strategy of the U.S. Team didn’t quite play out as it did last year, with much larger gaps opening up on the slick, rain-soaked course.
 
“It was a shorter, much more technical course this year and all the mud out there made it harder for anyone to gain much ground,” stated Marc Gullickson, USA Cycling’s National Mountain Bike Development Director. “The downhills were extremely muddy and technical, forcing riders to slow their descents.”
 
All four competitors on the U.S. squad will compete in their respective individual events later this week: Bennett in the Junior Cross-Country, Jurekovic in U23, and Gould and Craig in the final day’s Elite Cross-Country.
 
 
2008 WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP TEAM RELAY RESULTS
Total distance: 14.5 miles
 
1. France...Jean-Christophe Peraud (Orbea), Arnaud Jouffroy, Laurence LeBoucher, Alexis Vuillermoz (Scott Valloire Galibier)...1:24:45...10.3 mph av
2. Switzerland...Florian Vogel (Swisspower), Matthias Rupp (Scott Lactat), Petra Henzi (Fischer-BMC), Nino Schurter (Swisspower)...1:27:07
3. Italy...Marco Aurelio, Gerhard Kerschbaumer, Eva Lechner (Colnago Cap Arreghini), Cristian Cominelli (Gewiss Bianchi)...1:27:08
8. United States...Georgia Gould (Luna Chix), John Bennett (Whole Athlete), Sam Jurekovic (U23 National), Adam Craig (Giant)...1:30:12