Marco Dallago's Couch Garden beats Canada's Living the Dream in exciting final-round battle to take the 2014 Team World Championship ahead with the Austrian also poised to win the individual title on Saturday after posting a strong qualifying time.
Marco Dallago led his Couch Garden Crew to the 2014 Ice Cross Downhill Team World Championship with a thrilling victory in the season finale in Quebec City against Canada's top team Living the Dream on a frosty Friday night in Canada. The year's two top teams squaring off shoulder-to-shoulder in the three-on-three final down the 480-metre-long Quebec City track was a fitting finish to the Team Competition. Team Finland took third place after beating the 2013 champions, Swatch ProTeam, of Switzerland.
Couch Garden Crew, which also won the second race of the season in Saint Paul, found themselves in a tight battle on Friday, running neck-and-neck against Living the Dream out of the starting gate. But Kyle Croxall crashed while leading after the first gate, going down hard and spinning around. That allowed John Fisher and Marco Dallago to sprint into the lead for Couch Garden crew, which they never relinquished despite a valiant effort by hard-charging Scott Croxall and Adam Horst down the twisting, obstacle-filled track through the heart of Quebec City. Luca Dallago helped seal the victory by grabbing fourth place.
Go to redbullcrashedice.com/results for the full rundown of Friday's racing.
Couch Garden Crew's victory means they won the Team World Championship with 3,250 points ahead of Living the Dream (3,000 points), while the Crazy Canucks, the winners in Moscow, took third with 2,160 points.
It was a superb result capping a great day for Ice Cross Downhill World Championship leader Marco Dallago, who earlier on Friday took second place in the International Shootout just fractions of a second behind Fisher of Canada. Dallago (2,800 points) can clinch the championship on Saturday if he reaches the quarter finals. He holds a commanding lead over American Cameron Naasz (1,960 points), with 1,000 points up for grabs for first place.
"Things are looking pretty good right now," said Dallago. "If I get a good result, I win the world championship. I'm in the driver's seat. It wasn't easy to win the team competition, we really had to dig deep for it. It was an incredible race in the final."
Watch Red Bull Crashed Ice in Quebec City!
Catch all the action from the 2014 final of Red Bull Crashed Ice in Canada:
Webcast: We will stream the entire competition live right here on redbullcrashedice.com/quebec-live, and on Red Bull TV, Apple TV and Xbox 360 from 7.30pm (ET) on Saturday, March 22 (that's 12.30am CET on Sunday morning for viewers in Europe). Please note that the live webcast is geo-blocked in the US.
TV: The event will be broadcast nationally for the first time in the US on Fox Sports 1 on Monday, March 31, at 6.30pm (ET) and thereafter be available as Video On Demand on redbullcrashedice.com. Canadians can catch all of the action live on Rogers Sportsnet and TVA, starting at 8:30pm EST (Sportsnet) and 8:20pm EST (TVA).
Live Results: To get results and standings in real-time, hit redbullcrashedice.com/results.