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So was the infamous Instagram "hack" perpetrated by Loris? Is that why he's wearing a mask?
re: link checker - loris embargo was for today. b/c someone leaked the unlisted video 4 days ago, the news was blown and they made it private. the video being public today isn't "old news" really, it's just official.
Many pages back there was some speculation that BK going to a race in Indonesia was to sign her. That seems like it is probably not happening. So it begs the question, what's up with Pivot? Maybe they get Bulldog but that doesn't put them high up in the rankings. Will they be racing?
Just went back to look at the options for teams to qualify and if I've read it right there will 5 teams with season long wildcard entries with the selection criteria being
- UCI team ranking, current and previous season
- Profile of any individual riders
- UCI Team composition (multi-category, multi-gender)
- Profile of team sponsors (out of industry, global, etc.)
- Media profile of team (social media, etc.)
- Any injury issues during current or previous season
- Anti-doping history
In terms of profile of riders ,social media profile and team composition I would think Pivot would feature fairly high on the list , possibly Gwins team as well .
You would hope that teams that are going to have season long wildcards would know by now so they could get organized so maybe BK and Pivot know they don't need to spend money on riders to get into the races . Kerr has said in the past that his salary is basically what's left of the budget at the end of the season so there is an incentive to spend as little as possible I suppose.
Tbf I dunno if the UCI/ESO/Discovery+/whatever they are called like BK, he's talked a lot of shit, stopped filming race runs in protest and doesn't even run GoPro anymore (a key sponsor of the world cups), I was thinking earlier if Pivot would do a continental series instead of world cups but #1 Bernard would probably walk it if not be top 5 each round and #2 pivot ain't gonna spend hundreds of thousands on a proto and new bike for BK for him to race 2nd tier races and #3 pivot still have Ryan Griffith, Ed Masters, Jenna Hastings (lol), Matt Walker and Morgan Charre on the roster, big team and I haven't seen Morgan ride a DH bike on her story so whether or not she's doing DH this year is unknown, very weird team atm
They’re not even in the top 20 points wise, even if remy meier smith is joining them. I would like to believe BK is in the top 40 so he could race the WC himself if he wanted. No idea what the plan for the team is though.
With the current rumors they are ranked 20th. But that could change easily with Veronika Widmann (468 finals pts) reportedly signing a deal with an unknown team. If it's Pivot, they jump up to 16th. If it's Yeti or Cube, PFR is back to 21st. Any other team gets her, and Pivot won't move. There are fewer and fewer unaccounted for high ranking frequent WC riders left, unless they're planning on gambling on signing several Indonesian or Thai continental circuit riders with a lot of UCI points. That would be cool to see some unknown riders get exposure.
The change in Camera is from the massive push from insta360, lots of influences are being paid to talk bad about gopro currently.
Theres several people on the Pivot team that dont make sense like Ed masters... why is he still there?
matt walker is pretty good on the enduro rig but lacks support.
jenna... well we know...
Is morgane there just to hold a female enduro spot?
PFR is interesting... seems like a "these are my friends, we race together"
Eddie Masters brings more eyes to that team than probably anything. His YouTube channel is quite popular. He’s also no slouch in enduro, was just riddled with injuries that last bit.
Totally, the Enduro side of the team is pretty successful . Morganne is a race winner , Matt walker is a race winner and consistently top 10 and Eddie has had some bad luck with injury's but is certainly capable of good results if he can stay fit . If Pivot are still supporting the Enduro side then given the amount of teams that are pulling out then that's a good thing .
Jenna won as many races as Jake Jewett last year.
...and she won the Women's Elite New Zealand Continental Series race this last weekend beating Sascha Earnest who by many accounts is a podium threat for this upcoming women's World Cup season.
It's fun to pretend she's only around because her and BK are together, but I think a tough couple seasons for injuries made us forget that she's actually pretty fast and was a Junior World Champ.
They rank at 20 including Remy Meier Smith and Morgane on the team, i’ve not seen anything about Morgane racing DH this year
What we're seeing is the result of these rules changes: everything you said about Eddie is true, and none of it helps Pivot get into a guaranteed team slot. under the new rules, there's a significant argument that Pivot should have cut him loose for a rider with more points. Which is a huge shame.
The other interesting point is that Pivot is in 20th currently in points. which means, if the UCI wildcard selection generally follows the 15-20th ranking, which would be a reasonable assumption, but the UCI decides to exercise their discretion and pick one of the teams below 20th(like Gwin Racing,) Pivot would be first on the bubble to not get a slot. And if they they do give Pivot a slot, that means two teams with more points than those teams would be on the outside.
Edit: presuming there isn't a big change due to yet unannounced riders, of course.
Main problem for pivot is that Bernard is not best friend with chris ball, so the chances that they will be in the 5 selected teams are really low
Alright detectives, what do we have here? Trying to think of DH bikes with that shock orientation and I’m coming up with Zerode? Whats Bulldog riding?
Thank you for posting this. Too many people are using a racing rumors thread to talk crap on Kerr. It's also pretty sexist and BS that people are talking crap on Jenna when she works incredibly hard at her craft and has the speed. Can we move on from this please?
Can somebody who knows the new rules clarify: do the points gained at NZDH Coronet peak count towards riders' totals, or do only points gained in the last calendar year count?
Zerode seems like a good guess. The frame profile is a decent match for that blacked-out blob.
But what if it's not a downhill bike?
I would assume they get added. The wild card spots etc are based of the rankings one month before the World Cup. If it wasn’t a running total everyone would be at 0 points for the first race.
Zerode do like supporting fellow Kiwi's, and the Bulldog has worked ok with MS in the past, so I wouldn't rule it out.
That piece of frame going over the shock looks very Santa Cruz trail/enduro
Bernard seems to have money though - never looks like he is struggling, cars, motos, homes and lots of trips. Doubt youtube covers all that. Maybe he just does it for fun, seems a lot like it.
Might be wrong but there does not seem to be a blacked out derallieur hanger…
my first thought: Ibis HD6. Zerode seems more reasonable though...
With Ibis cutting their race teams I doubt they’re gonna sign bulldog. My bet is on Zerode
Hey,
About a week ago Amaury posted a story with a blacked out bike, 3 days ago he posted a photo on road training with a Specialized Tarmal SL8 S-Works road bike. I know Commencal does not have a road bike, but for god's sake, choosing the one from the very very biggest rival is a strange move, he could have chosen a totally neutral road brand like Factor or Colnago instead. Maybe he is heading to big S?
A bit of shameless promotion, but hopefully it's relevant. I just put out a podcast episode where me and Alan Milway chat through all the 2025 team moves (confirmed and rumoured). Hopefully it's an interesting watch/listen. https://youtu.be/Mu0JAhGceB8 or https://www.downtimepodcast.com/team-moves-2025/ Clearly this forum gets a mention! Thanks to everyone here who keeps the rumour fire burning, I personally love it!
If you say it's strange moves, must be strange moves. To some it's a rider and a bike. Unless you penned his contract or are his sports agent, get over it and strangely move on.
Specialized Gravity already announced their team, Amaury still has Commencal-Mucoff on his profile, and he's still rocking Commencal kit.
The photo doesn't make it obvious what brand or bike it is anyway, at least not to the casual observer. There is usually a blacklist of brands that athletes/employees can't use but by the looks of it, Specialized isn't on Commencal's list.
There is a long list of possibilities for why he chose it. Who knows, maybe Loic gave it to him or got him a deal? I'll put my conspiracy hat on and say that since Commencal has gone full SRAM,they got a sweet deal on some Specialized road bikes since the two red brands are so well connected. Odds are with it simply being the bike he preferred from the deals he was able to get.
What I find more interesting about all of it is whether Amaury is clowning us with a blacked-out bike or is Commencal already rocking the latest Supreme on the trails?
IIRC,
BK didn't stop filming race runs to protest, ESO no longer allowed riders to film their race runs. BK did complain about it, rightfully so.
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