FINAL RESULTS: Callaghan and Ravanel Win EWS Madeira

The sun was out and with it the promise of a fantastic final day of racing here in Madeira. But as we've become accustomed to in the EWS, that doesn't mean smooth sailing for everybody. Overnight leader Adrien Dailly took a costly tumble on stage one, which saw him drop down to 21st and left young Jesse Melamed with a 14 second lead in the overall and 4 stages to go. Martin Maes took the first stage win of the day, with Sam Hill charging to 4th place just 5 seconds back (over 7 minutes of racing). Oton, Scott, Clementz, and Graves were all right back in the mix too - anything could still happen at this point! In the women's field, Isabeau Courdurier made good on her promise to at least win a stage, putting 1.3 seconds into Cecile Ravanel on the very first stage of the day, with overnight sensation Noga Korem holding her own with another third place stage performance and the third place overall.

Dailly bounced back from his tumble to win stage 6, which saw him claw his way back up to 15th. Maes and Hill rounded out the stage podium, leaving them in 4th and 6th, respectively. It's on!

In the women's, Cecile got back to her stage winning ways with the slimmest of margins, taking stage 6 by just 0.8 seconds over Isabeau. Korem slipped up a bit, ending up in 9th on the stage, but bounced back in stage 7 coming in third just 3 seconds back of DH specialist Miranda Miller who made the most of this short and very technical stage to claim her first ever EWS stage win.

Sadly, stage 7 would deal a cruel blow to our race leader Jesse Melamed, a destroyed wheel putting an end to his reign at the top of the race standings and his run towards a maiden EWS race win (he eventually zip-tied it together to try to carry on riding, but it ended up disintegrating on stage 8). Scott also punctured on 7, Rude crashed, and Dailly blew a tire clean off his rim - leaving Greg Callahan in the lead. Maes and Oton now sat just 5 seconds back, with Hill lurking a further 20 seconds down should anybody in the current podium trio slip up. A remarkable come back performance from the flat pedal thunder after the physical stages of day one had left him sitting 12th overall. So with two stages to go, it was all still to play for!

Stage 8 saw the return of Richie Rude, putting down an epic run to win the stage and haul himself up to 7th in the overall. Callaghan held onto the race lead but a charging Maes was now only 2 seconds back. Going down to the wire! Cecile gave herself more breathing space with yet another stage win here, now 1 minute clear of Courdurier in 2nd. Korem still holding onto that third spot and her first ever podium finish was in sight!

Stage 9, and all was to play for. The women came down first, with Cecile cementing another dominant victory with a stage win ahead of Courdurier and cinderella story Noga Korem, a privateer who just took the #401 number plate to her first ever EWS podium!

As for the men, we'd have to wait to the very end - and it was a fair fight to the finish! Greg Callaghan held his nerve, third on the stage good enough for the Irishman to claim another EWS race win! Maes and Oton round out the podium ahead of a surging Graves and everybody's favorite flat pedal shredder in 5th.