Venue
Graz/Stattegg
Veranstaltungszentrum Lässerhof
Hofweg 3
8046 Stattegg
AUSTRIA

Date
14th - 18th of August 2017
Overall ranking of 4 races
Team Relay
Mountainbike Combined
XC X-Large
XCO
The first of the individual overall rankings U15 m/w and U17 m/w will be European Champion!
The best teams overall will be honored too, but no official European team champions will be awarded!

Categories
U15 > women and men > age groups 2003 and 2004
U17 > women and men > age groups 2001 and 2002

Entry conditions
Participation is possible for national, regional and club teams.
The entries will be collected directly by the organizer. National teams must be nominated and registered by the national federations. Registrations can be made unexceptionally for teams as a whole by the team manager. All members of one team must be in the same category (U15 or U17).
Every team has to consist of a fixed number of 3 riders. Not less than one girl has to be part of each team!
A lot of teams consist of two men and one woman. Teams with 2 or 3 girls are allowed too.
One Feed Zone pass per team will be given to the coaches. Every participant and team manager is going to be officially accredited.
Every team will have to pay an entry fee for the participation ( € 180,- per team of 3 riders).
You have to register your teams (entry-form will be Online from the end of May) and to book your hotel rooms (if you do this via the organizer) until the 28th of June.
The explicit information about your riders you need to send us until the 26th of July.
If you allow us to process the booking for you, you get bed and breakfast for one person of each team for free, no difference between national- regional- and club teams.

Lunch and dinner in the event center Lässerhof can be ordered ( about € 18,- per day and person – please inform us about special food habits (vegetarian, no pork, coeliac disease food, ..) – a central catering station is going to be installed right next to the start/finish area. This should encourage the team sprit of the participants.

A Camping Area (water, bike wash, electricity and showers (at the football stadium)) will be provided too (€ 28,- per Camper/Caravan and night, unequal how many persons). Team-Tent Areas are also available.

Last year (in 2016) 135 teams with 3 riders each had been registered, that means a total of 405 riders in the categories U15 and U17. 

Ranking
The total of the rankings (number) in the 4 single races will count for the overall ranking.
The rider with the lowest total per category will be European Champion.
In the case of parity the following will count:
> The lowest total after 4 races
> The higher number of low rankings (1., 2., 3., and so on)
> The lower overall time
The 3-rider-teams have to start  at the Team Relay on the first race day. For each rider of the team the ranking of the team in the Team Relay will count for the overall ranking. From the second race day on each rider has to race on its own.
There will be an overall team ranking too.

Programme:
> 14th of august: (from 12:00 a.m.) Accreditation, Team Time Trial (Prologue for fixing the starting order of the team relay.),
                                Opening Ceremony
> 15th of august: Cross Country Team Relay
> 16th of august: Mountainbike Combined
> 17th of august: Cross Country X-Large
> 18th of august: Cross Country Olympic,  Closing Ceremony, After Race Party (till 12:00 p.m....)

The Time-Trial for the regulation of the starting grid for the Team Relay will take place on Monday, 14th of August at 17:30 o´clock as a Team-Time-Trial . Each 3-riders-team has to complete a course of about 2 minutes lenght together. The ride-time of the slowest team-member is essential for the ranking for the Team Relay.


XCO -  4 combined competitions
The European Champions are to be determined in an overall ranking based on 4 competitions on 4 different race days. Those 4 competitions are XCO, XCO Team Relay, XCO Combined and XCO X-Large. Each competition will have a small winners’ ceremony afterwards, awarding the first 3 with trophies. After each contest the participant leading the overall ranking receives the Leader Jersey, which he/she has to wear during the following race of the ECH. Official UEC European Youth Mountainbike Champion will be only the winner of the overall ranking in the categories U15 and U17 men and women. This will reduce the pressure on the participants not depending on a single result.
Including a Team Relay in the overall ranking will also encourage the team spirit. The start/finish area for XCO, XCO Team Relay, XCO Combined is located at an altitude of 419m above sea level, around the event centre of Stattegg Lässerhof. The ground floor of the event centre will be in case of bad weather conditions available for the prize giving ceremonies.
 
XCO Combined > A technical competition for bike kids
The XCO Combined was designed for the Austrian Mountainbike Youngster Cup and has been tested for seven years now in several races in Austria. A competition of 8 technical sections (will be arranged at the Dorfplatz Stattegg, the main place of the village of Stattegg) is combined with an XCO race. Each section counts 1, 2 or 3 points. The rider with the highest score is starting to the XCO at first. The starting time of the other riders depends on their handicaps of points (similar to the Nordic Combined with Gundersenmethod). The rider, who reaches the finish first, will be the winner of the XCO Combined. A detailed regulation for XCO Combined (= Mountainbike Kombination), an automatic scoring system based on Microsoft excel and a lot of different suggestions for sections for the technical competition have been worked out and tested. The goal of the XCO Combined is to improve the technical skills of the young riders.

>> Pictures and Videos of the MTB Combined at the UEC Youth MTB Championships 2016 >>

Technical data XCO-Circuit (alternating):

about 3 km circuit tour, 120m climbing
ground: asphalt (5%), gravel, soil, grass
climbing : descending = 50 : 50
wide track : narrow track = 50 : 50
fast sections : slow technical sections = 40 : 60

Course for XCO X-Large
The start/finish area is located at an altitude of 419m above sea level, around the event centre of Stattegg Lässerhof. The ground floor of the event centre will be in case of bad weather conditions available for the prize giving ceremonies. Some parts of the course of the 2009 UCI MTB Marathon World Championships are used for the XCO X-Large.

Technical data XCO X-Large:

U15/U17w: 12km circuit tour, 490hm climbing 1 round
U17m: 14km circuit tour, 570hm climbing 1 round

ground: asphalt (25%), gravel, soil, grass
climbing : descending = 50 : 50
wide track : narrow track = 75 : 25
fast sections : slow technical sections = 75 : 25

>> Pictures and Videos of the XCO-X-Large at the UEC Youth MTB Championships 2016 >>

Ceremonies: The daily ceremonies will take place directly at the start/finish area at Lässerhof. The official opening ceremony will be arranged at the Dorfplatz Stattegg, the main place of the village of Stattegg.