The downhill seeding runs at the World Championships in Les Gets have taken place. Obviously the correlation between performance in seeding runs and in the finals is never a terribly straightforward one, what with changing conditions, tactical slowness, the potential for mistakes when it matters and all the rest of it. But things are looking good for the British contingent…

In the men’s field there’s four British riders in the top ten – Steve Peat’s on top spot with 2:44.00, with Gee Atherton 2.3 seconds behind. Then there’s Cedric Gracia, Joel Panozzo and David Vazquez, with Neil Donoghue in 6th spot. Then it’s Julien Camellini, Oscar Saiz and Nathan Rennie, with Dan Atherton in 10th. Just 5.6 seconds separate all of them. It’s going to be close.

It’s not looking so good in the women’s field. Unsurprisingly, Anne-Caroline Chausson is out in front with 3:04.51. Fastest Brit is Fionn Griffiths in 14th, while Helen Gaskell appears to be down as DNS – we’re not sure what’s happened to her. Tracy Moseley’s not racing through injury, so it looks like British hopes rest with Fionn.

The other category to watch is the Junior Women – Rachel Atherton’s lying fourth there, behind leader Scarlett Hagen and twin sisters Audrey and Laetitia Le Corguille.

A couple of titles have already been decided. The XC Team Relay was won by the Canadian team of Geoff Kabush, Max Plaxton, Kiara Bisaro and Raphael Gagne. The Junior Women XC title goes to Switzerland’s Nathalie Schneitter. Britain’s Nikki Harris came 20th.