Ethan Craik Wins the UCI Downhill Mountain Biking Junior World Cup
@ItchenCollege student Ethan Craik has won the UCI Downhill Mountain Biking Junior World Cup! The competition would ordinarily consist of races across multiple countries worldwide. However, as a result of the ongoing Covid pandemic, Ethan was declared the overall champion after participating in four races. These consisted of two in Portugal, where he finished 1st and 3rd and two in Slovenia, where he finished 4th and 7th.
Ethan only made the switch to downhill mountain biking in 2017. Before this, he had previously won BMX championships at Southern, National and British Level.
Ethan is a very talented rider and is currently sponsored by GT Factory Racing, who sponsor riders from all over the world in not just downhill mountain biking, but in enduro and BMX too. He is also supported by the Talented Athlete Scholarship Scheme (TASS) here at Itchen College, which allows him to work hard in both his sporting and academic pursuits.
James Bedwell, TASS Dual Career Coordinator at Itchen College, discusses Ethan’s success and the exceptional support he has in place:
“This is an incredible achievement by Ethan and we are all very proud of him here at Itchen College. To become Junior World Champion whilst studying a full-time programme of A-levels is a perfect example of how the TASS Dual Career Programme works at Itchen. Ethan was away competing for just over a month and his teachers from Art, Maths and History have done a great job keeping Ethan up to date and providing materials through Google Classroom so he can still succeed in his final exams at the end of this academic year”.
Speaking on his Junior World Cup success, Ethan Craik said:
“There’s not really a feeling like it, it’s insane. When the last person comes down and your still at the top (of the leader board)… I had no words for about an hour”.
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