Australian downhill star Sam Hill will join the Specialized team next season, BikeRadar has confirmed at the Interbike tradeshow in Las Vegas.
The Aussie will be riding a Demo to start with but Specialized are planning to develop a new bike with Sam in the not-too-distant future. This marks Specialized's full return to world cup downhill racing and with Trek promising to sign new riders to race the Session '88 it promises to be an exciting year.
Marc Beaumont is on GT for the 09 season! The Steve Peat prodigy and Team Santa Cruz-Bikeradar rider has always been a prominent force on the world cup circuit as well as being a brilliant ambassador for the sport. With a new full carbon downhill bike in the prototype stages, GT needed the best to test and develop this machine and get it up to world cup racing standards, and Marc Beaumont was their choice.
On the other hand, GT are losing two of their other top gravity riders: Australian Bryn Atkinson and American Jill Kintner. Their next destinations have yet to be confirmed.