It was the first downhill event hosted by the new Gippsland Mountain Bike Club.

In stark contrast to the fog and mud of the previous season's round at Baw Baw, this time racers were treated to blue skies and dusty braking bumps.

Saturday practice had the more than 220 entrants cramming runs thanks to the well-organisBlue skies and temperatures in the low 20s made for great riding conditions.

The Baw Baw track would best be described as ``old school''. No big jumps, no steep deathly chutes of death, in fact a beginner could ride the whole track from top to bottom in complete safety.

Riding the track fast proved to be quite another matter however, with big ruts, loose rocks, blind corners and a drifty layer of dust and small rocks over much of the track helping to sort the boys from the men, though some of the under 19 boys had other ideas.

After a couple of hours practice, the relatively small elite field was treated to a seeding run with series points, meaning everyone qualified and even those who crashed got to race.

Alex Swann qualified first, a comfortable three seconds ahead of Jeremy Hamilton with crowd favourite Woody 0.02s behind in third.

In the under 19s, Aden Wyber qualified first by a massive 10 seconds, six seconds quicker than the fastest elite time.

Expert men were looking as tight as ever after qualifying, with the top 10 separated by just four seconds.

When the dust settled after race runs, Ben Rohloff took the win by just 0.65s.

Despite what looked like a number of near misses in practice, evidently nobody told Ricky Clarke that hardtails aren't meant to go that fast, but a solid run saw him destroy the hardtail class by almost 15s.

Race organiser Nick King showed off his local knowledge, taking out the veterans' by a couple of seconds, and fellow Gippslander Leonie Picton beat off her only competition in the elite women, sister Tracey, by 30 seconds.

As the sun got lower in the sky and the shadows drew out ever longer, the under 19s and elites strapped up for a second run.

Wyber couldn't quite match his stellar qualifier in the under 19, but again beat off serial podium offender Ben Barrett to take the win by two seconds, with Marcus Fairbanks a close third.ed schedule.Quiet achiever and second top qualifier Jeremy Hamilton upped the ante to knock five seconds off his qualifying time to take his first elite win over Hocken and Swann.