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Inside Rachel Atherton’s stunning UCI Downhill World Cup victory
After a surprise appearance in 2022, Rachel Atherton returned to the Mountain Bike World Cup to claim a beautiful victory in Lenzerheide, Switzerland. Here’s how it happened.
She’s a six-time world champion, but going into the UCI Mountain Bike World Cup in Lenzerheide, Rachel Atherton had raced only once since 2019. That was a surprise appearance in 2022's contest, where she narrowly missed a podium finish. The question on everyone’s mind, then, was does this champion still have what it takes?
This year, however, something just felt right, and everything aligned in the 35-year-old’s favour, helping her bag victory in her 40th UCI MTB World Cup in the women’s elite race, with a time of just three minutes 7.514 seconds.
“I just actually can’t believe it, it hasn’t really sunk in,” Atherton said after the race. “You get so fired up and then it’s three minutes and it’s over. Coming into this I didn’t know if I would qualify, yesterday [qualification] was mind-blowing. I was like: ‘Woah!’ And this new format is so hard, doing semi-finals, you’ve got to save some energy. It’s mental, oh my gosh!”
Still trying to process this race! Still can’t believe it happened!
Rachel Atherton rides at UCI DH World Cup in Lenzerheide
© Bartek Wolinksi
Atherton’s win denied Camille Balanche of a home-soil victory. Earlier in the contest, while France’s Marine Cabirou set the tone early with a 3:11.118. Meanwhile, world champion Vali Höll went on to top this with a 3:09.270, after recovering from a nasty flip over her handlebars in the semi-finals. Ultimately, none of it would be enough to beat the Brit.
Posting on social media, Atherton said she is “still trying to process this race! Still can’t believe it happened!” The win will be doubly sweet considering the Achilles tendon issues that have mostly prevented her from competing since she suffered an injury to the tendon during practice at Les Gets in 2019.
With the injury taking years rather than months to heal, Atherton was not sure whether she would ever return to the elite ranks, but decided to travel to Switzerland to give it a shot again and managed to come through the qualification format to ride in the final.
During the race, commentator Cedric Gracia called Atherton “the fastest mum in the world”. In fact, after the race, she went straight to feed her 21-month old daughter, Arna. “People said, 'Leave her at home and come out and focus on yourself,' but having her here helps me relax and takes your mind off it,” Atherton said after the race.
"I feel a bit of a responsibility to race and to show that you can have a baby and still do sport," she added, while admitting that racing as a mum does bring new pressures. “If you get hurt, you can't just kick back at home until you're fixed… I'd have to carry on being a mum and feeding her and all the stuff that it entails… I think you just need to be more calculated and a bit more clever; rather than going fast, you've got to find different ways to be fast.”
Calculated, clever, and brave. When she grows up, we’re sure Arna couldn’t be prouder of her mother’s historic run.
