McLeod third in Argentina as Buchanan extends her series lead

Sep 08, 2014

Written by Bart de Jong

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Australia’s Melinda McLeod took a superb third place at the fourth round of the UCI BMX Supercross World Cup in Santiago del Estero, while Caroline Buchanan has extended her overall lead in the series with one round remaining. McLeod, who qualified seventh fastest for the final, started ferociously as she jumped to a clear second heading into the first turn, with only Saturday’s time-trial winner and Olympic champion Mariana Pajon ahead of her. McLeod fought hard to the line narrowly losing out to American Alice Post to finish third, while

Pajon made it a perfect set of weekend wins.

Series leader Buchanan who raced a superb time trial on Saturday looked in ominous form heading into Sunday’s racing format and successfully navigated her way to the final amid highly competitive racing. Despite a sluggish start resulting in a seventh placed finish, the 2012 series champion extended her gap at the top to 150 points over Dutchman Laura Smulders, and will be hard to catch ahead of the now highly anticipated final round in Chula Vista.

In the elite men Australian young gun Anthony Dean looked every bit a series contender as he cemented his spot in the final on the back of near flawless racing. Unfortunately Dean didn’t start as sprightly as he would have liked, before losing control of the bike over the first jump to fall out of race contention. Duel Olympic champion Maris Strombergs went on to claim victory ahead of series leader Liam Phillips.

Dean now trails Phillips by 130 points going into the final round, having jumped into second spot in the series at the expense of Frenchman Joris Daudet.

The Australian contingent will now return to their home bases in Australia and the USA, in preparation for the final World Cup event in Chula Vista, USA on September 26-27, where Buchanan and Dean in particular will have everything to ride for.

Pics by Craig Dutton.