By this excellent result on Saturday, October 13 in French seaside town Frejus, Czech rider Michal Prokop concluded the pre-Olympic BMX season. In the last of four races of the World Cup of the new Olympic discipline BMX Supercross he won after an excellent performance the second place. Thus he repeated the last year’s position on the same place and took up the fourth place of the previous round of the World Cup in Salt Lake City. After the unlucky first part of this year’s season Michal Prokop sprung from the twelfth position up to the fifth place in the overall standing of the BMX SX World Cup 2007. After he won in invitational “BMX Fast Cross” race in Italy one week ago and after the following training on quality French tracks in the neighbourhood of Frejus Michal Prokop vindicated by his fifth place in qualification that he is back in his usual good form. In comparison with the last year he praised the track and by his clear win in the quarter-finals and semi-finals as well he secured his advantageous position at the internal part of the track on the start of the finals. He described the course of the final ride as follows: „I managed to start well, but in the first turn I had to jump over the falling down Latvian Matisons. I reached to the leading position, but after this incident I lost the speed for the second straight, in which I was overtaken by New Zealander Willers.”
Michal’s coach Radim Mencik adds: „It seems to me that Michal is definitely out of the loss of the first part of the season. He is back in his good condition and there is again his vim in his performance of the last year, so he is again back in the game for the absolute top. The way he took the control over the semi-finals was really fantastic!”
Records of individual rides of Michal Prokop on his way to the second place in the final round of the UCI BMX
World Cup 2007 you can watch for example on following addresses:
Quarter-finals:
http://www.martijnscherpen.net/frejus 2007/2007 frejus elite men quarter 2.wmv
Semi-finals:
http://www.martijnscherpen.net/frejus 2007/2007 frejus elite men semi 1.wmv
Finals:
http://www.martijnscherpen.net/frejus 2007/2007 frejus elite men final.wmv
Final overall standing in UCI BMX Supercross World Cup 2007:
1. De Wilde Robert The Netherlands 46 points
2. Robinson Donny USA 35 points
3. Godet Damien France 32 points
4. Day Mike USA 30 points
5. Prokop Michal Czech Republic 28 points
Overall standing in the series:
http://www.uci.ch/modello.asp?1stLevelID=EB&level1=3&level2=0&idnews=4818
Complete results in individual races:
http://www.uci.ch/modello.asp?1stLevelID=EB&level1=2&level2=0
On the way to Beijing
Michal Prokop, as the company rider of the Czech trademark of Author bikes, brought himself to the attention of sports public particularly thanks to his dominant position in fourcross of mountain bikes, where he has already acquired all accessible tittles and he defended them all as well. As the double World Champion, double European Champion, and double winner of the 4X World Cup Michal Prokop belongs
among the few exceptional Czech sportsmen, in the case of whom the one of us may afford to consider any other placing except win in the top world competition as something surprising. Besides this, Michal Prokop unlike most of his other competitors devotes himself equally to two related, but still different disciplines!
Immediately after BMX Racing was incorporated in the program of Olympic Games 2008 in Beijing the historically most successful Czech BMX rider together with his coach and manager agreed a racing and training program, which prefers BMX to some other fourcross events in accordance with the approaching
date of Olympic Games. At the short break before beginning of the Olympic season, which starts already in December of this year, and considering the large number of nomination races concentrated in five months, we can see Michal on 4X tracks only exceptionally.
BMX Racing arose at the turn of the sixties and the seventieth in USA and it got to the Czechoslovakia for the first time in 1984. Thousands of riders participated in races under supervision of Svazarm and CSTV. The hit at that time was a simple bicycle called Velamos BMX 20, which contributed to the mass spread of BMX among the youth. After the Svazarm structures fell apart the Czech bicross underwent a not very happy development and it significantly took a back seat. However, the ten thousands visits at world championships
in various parts of the world show that it is a very attractive sport for spectators.
And what says Michal Prokop about BMX? „The competition in BMX Racing is even keener than in fourcross.
Premiere of BMX in Olympic Games is my long-lasting goal, but the most important thing will be to get there.
The thing is that according to the current system not individuals but countries are nominated. It means that
the three best riders of a certain country score in the rank of nations and only based on the position in it the
national federation may nominate a certain number of riders. The better result the country achieves, the
larger number of its riders it may send out to the Olympic Games. The country may achieve points in world
championships, in World Cup, and in continental championships. For the time being only I am scoring on
behalf of the Czech Republic permanently, because there are not much riders with real chance to score and
therefore it will be very difficult to defend the eighth position at least in the ranking of nations ensuring two
places in Beijing. My goal is clear: to get so many points to be able to nominate to the Olympic Games to be
able to bring some medal!”
Just one year before the Olympic ride Michal Prokop acquired the first experience with the local track at the
second of the BMX SX World Cup races: „The area is beautiful and the Olympic Games could start there
already today, but the track is not my cup of tea yet. It does not suit me at all and I hope they will still work
on it. The jumps on the first straight are too short; it’s very difficult to subdue them. On the second straight
the jumps are very big, but the speed is slower. Obviously, I am not content with the result, but on the
other hand, I am glad that I could see it here and I hope I will be able to rectify the result in the next
year…”
The complete story (in Czech) you can find here: http://www.mtbs.cz/Zavody/supercross07-bmx-beijing_cl.html
photos: Jan Nemec (mtbs.cz)
