Ten of the 13 Americans in this weekends BMX Supercross World Cup event in Papendal, including all three of the US women, reached the Sunday knockout rounds after advancing from qualifying. All of the top riders advanced, though not all comfortably. Shealen Reno took a DNF in her first of three qualifying runs but overcame the slow start with back-to-back second place finishes to qualify in the 15th of 24 spots to advance to the quarterfinals. In the time trial portion Alise Post had the second best time in the field of eight.

The best men in qualifying were Barry Nobles and Jeffrey Upshaw who each won two of their three qualifying heats and qualified in 9th and 11th. Tanner Sebesta was the last American to qualify finishing 37th among the 48 qualifiers. Tyler Faoro missed out on qualifying after finishing fifth in his final qualifying run having won his second run. Corben Sharrah finished eighth of the 16 time trial participants.

The rest of the event will take place on Sunday with knockout rounds leading to the hotly contested finals. The US has taken at least one medal in each of the first two events of the year and placed multiple riders in the final in both men’s and women’s competition.

Previous BMX Supercross World Cup:
Papendal Preview

The BMX Supercross World Cup will reach the halfway point after stopping in Papendal, Netherlands this weekend. Thirteen Americans are set to participate this weekend with top contenders on both the men’s and women’s side. While Connor Fields is still out on the men’s side after injuring his wrist before the stop in Manchester but Santiago winner Corben Sharrah gives the US a threat to win it all. Sharrah will be looking to rebound after finishing last in the final in Manchester. Sharrah and Nicholas Long, in the final in both of the first two stops but yet to medal, are guaranteed spots in the 1/8 finals and will be seeded based on Saturday’s time trials while the other eight Americans, including Santiago semifinalist Jeffrey Upshaw, will compete in qualifying for one of the 48 other spots in the 1/8 finals.

The two top threats on the women’s side are Brooke Crain and Alise Post, both of whom have made the final in the first two events. Post is yet to medal but Crain grabbed the bronze in Manchester. Crain and Post both are in the time trials and guaranteed quarterfinal spots while Shealen Reno, in her first appearance of the year, will be in qualifying.

Previous BMX Supercross World Cup:
Manchester Recap

As the BMX Supercross event in Manchester, England turned to the knockout rounds on Sunday three American women were in contention with Alise Post the favorite of the pack. Post made things every so slightly nervous by finishing sixth in the second of three runs but won the other two to advance from her pool in second place. Qualifying to move on a bit easier were Brooke Crain, who was second in all three runs in her pool, and Danielle George who finished second twice and third one to advance. George and Crain would be together in the first heat of the semifinals but only Crain moved on as she won the heat and George did not finish. Crain was joined in the final by Post who won her heat by about three quarters of a second.

The final was full of calamity as Post and four others ended up a full eight seconds behind the winner and thus left a final three to compete for the medals. Caroline Buchanan of Australia ended up first, her second straight win to open the season, while Crain finished third. Post would ultimately finish fourth.

After two events Crain sits on 300 points with Post at 280 as they are fifth and sixth in the total standings. George is in 12th. While Buchanan may be pulling out of reach with two wins to open the year second place is only 50 points ahead of Crain.

On the men’s side of things five Americans were in the motos and three of them would move on. In the second heat both Corben Sharrah and Jeffrey Upshaw were both competing and there quickly became a lot of space between them as Sharrah won the first two runs while Upshaw finished fourth and fifth. With the top four advancing there was a real chance for Upshaw in the final run but he finished sixth, just 0.4 behind Coretin Dubois of France and that margin was enough to advance Dubois instead of Upshaw. Sharrah meanwhile made it a clean sweep of all three runs

Heat four had two Americans as well, Nicholas Long and Thomas Zula. Long went third-second-second to advance without too much pressure while Zula went fourth-sixth to put real pressure on him going into the final run. A top-three finish might have been enough but Zula wound up fifth and was eliminated. Finally David Herman was easily into the quarterfinals with a first-second-second in his heat.

Herman saw his competition come to an end in the quarterfinals after a sixth place finish over three second behind fourth. Long and Sharrah on the other hand both won their heats, Long by about a half a second and Sharrah by a full second. The second semifinal heat was an All-American showdown as Long and Sharrah battled for the top spot . Sharrah was over a half second ahead but both advanced to the final.

A clean final saw all eight riders finish within two seconds but it was Liam Phillips of Germany in first and Long as the top American, in fourth. Sharrah was last, he got a decent start but was last in turn one and never could recover to get back up in the field.

Despite the last place finish Sharrah still leads the overall competition through two of five events. Long is second while Connor Fields who broke a bone in his wrist and was not able to compete is still in ninth.

The next event is in Papendal, Netherlands on May 7th and 8th while the final two events are after the Olympics.

The top performing American on Saturday in qualifying at the BMX Supercross event was Alise Post. The 25-year old posted the top time in the women’s time trial at 31.844. Post and Brooke Crain, who also was in the time trial, are joined by Danielle George in the 32-woman field for the knockout rounds tomorrow. George managed to win all three rounds to earn her spot on Sunday.

On the men’s side of things Corben Sharrah was second in the time trial with Nicholas Long 13th and Jeffrey Upshaw not finishing. All three will be joined in the final by David Herman and Thomas Zula. Herman qualified fairly easily with two firsts and a second in his three rounds while Zula two thirds and a fourth were just enough to grab one of the final 13 slots.

The action in Manchester beings at 10:15 AM ET and will feature multiple knockout rounds as the field is narrowed to a final eight on each side with the finals beginning at 1:10 PM ET. BMXLive.TV is supposed to have a free live stream of some of the event.

The people of Manchester, England will be treated to the always exciting BMX Supercross this weekend as the second of five events on this year’s world cup takes place. The first event two weeks ago in Argentina saw Americans Corben Sharrah and Connor Fields go 1-2 on the men’s side. Sharrah is in the start list for this week’s event while Fields is not after breaking a bone in his hand in preparations for this event. The injury will be a big challenge for Fields as he fights to get healthy and in form to compete for a gold medal in Rio. Nicholas Long, who was in the final in Argentina, is another one of the US competitors.

On the women’s side two of the four competitors were finalists in Argentina, though neither Brooke Crain or Alise Post were able to medal. Most competitors go through three rounds of qualifying on Saturday to try and reach the top 48 for men and the top 24 for the women to advance to Sunday’s elimination rounds. The top 16 men and the top 8 women are exempted from this qualification process and will run a time trial on Saturday night to get their seeding for Sunday’s elimination rounds. Qualification begins at 12 PM ET with the time trials at 3:10 PM ET.