South Africa's Greg Minnaar took a win at the prestigious Kokanee Crankwork event at Whistler Mountain, Canada, in the Dual Slalom event.
After qualifying 5th, Greg was determined to put his bad luck behind him. Earlier in the week, in the Air Downhill, Greg suffered a slow puncture after clipping a rock and lost valuable time to event winner Brian Lopes, eventually finishing third.
"I lost about 2 seconds in that race, and was pretty bummed about it as I thought I had a really good chance to get the Honda RN01 to the line first," said Minnaar shortly after the event. It's the first time that the Honda bike has made an appearance at Whistler, and according to Greg it created a bit of a scene among the fans who hadn't seen one yet.
For the Dual Slalom Greg rode his GM 4X bike and he had a pretty easy run through the earlier rounds, until he came up against gravity legend Cedric Gracia.
"I really respect Cedric, and you can never be too complacent racing him, he's a danger man on any course, in any race".
After defeating Cedric, the final put him up against downhill rider of the season, Sam Hill. Minnaar made the most of the course in front of the large crowd who were really into the new event, and came out with the win against the Australian.
"Any time you score a win against Sam, it does a lot for your confidence. I'm really happy I came to Crankworx this year, and now I'm looking forward to my summer break back home for a couple of weeks."
1st. Greg Minnaar (RSA)
2nd. Sam Hill (AUS)
3rd. JD Swanguen (USA)
4th. Andrew Neethling (RSA)