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Relive the races that defined Loïc Bruni's World Cup-winning season
The French downhill racer didn't have the perfect season, but delivered when it mattered the most to win the overall World Cup title. Relive the highs and lows of his 2021 racing season here.
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Loïc Bruni has raced elite downhill since 2011 and at 27, he's been there and done it all. The four-time World Champion has seven World Cup wins to his name and 31 top five finishes. Having previously won the World Cup overall title in 2019, he's a man who knows how to put a season together.
Going into 2021 Mercedes-Benz UCI Downhill Mountain Bike World Cup season, Bruni had far from ideal preparation. He was injured at the start of year, just as he began his 2021 season training in earnest, and he then contracted the Covid-19 virus. Following recovery from that, he then broke his heel and another enforced break ensued.
Bruni probably felt he was coming into the first race in Leogang in June half-cooked. Still troubled by heel issues, a 10th place finish in Austria was probably the best result he could have hoped for.
Bruni showed in his 2021 season that anything is possible
© Bartek Wolinski/Red Bull Content Pool
He experienced a further rollercoaster of results and emotions for the rest of the season, but the Frenchman was able to somehow deal with the ups and downs that came about to emerge with some silverware – a second World Cup Overall title.
Here, we look at the five races that defined his 2021 season.
01
Ups and downs in Les Gets
Given Bruni's early season health and injury issues, a 10th place at Leogang was by no means a bad result. Les Gets was the next race and there was much to look forward to for Bruni at what was his home World Cup race. His previous race in Les Gets in 2019 had seen him finish second, beaten only an inspired run by fellow Frenchman Amaury Pierron. Qualifying went well. Bruni won, taking maximum World Cup points.
15 min
Downhill highlights – Les Gets
Catch up on the highlights from the DH race in Les Gets, where the racing conditions delivered many surprises.
Everything was set for finals and a win in front of adoring French fans, except the French weather wasn't playing ball. Heavy rain intervened and the course slowed considerably for the riders at the end, so much so that when Bruni crossed the line, he had the 50th best time. He admitted that the results from Leogang and Les Gets had left him mentally a bit low.
02
Hitting the reset button at Maribor
By the time Maribor came around in August, Bruni was free of issues from his heel injury. He resolved to get some help for how he was feeling mentally, realising that the health and injury issues of the first half of the year had taken a toll and that wasn't allowing to ride to his full potential.
In Maribor, Bruni was more at ease with himself on a dry, dusty course that played to his strengths. His qualifying time was unspectacular, but his finals run saw him finish fifth and in doing so score his first podium of the season.
26 min
Maribor downhill recap
Join us for a recap of all the men's and women's downhill racing on a dry track at Maribor, Slovenia.
03
Overcoming injury in Lenzerheide
Bruni would have been forgiven for thinking that this really wasn't his year as he went to race the fourth round of the World Cup in Lenzerheide. Two crashes the previous weekend at the World Championships in Val di Sole had left him so sore that he was unable to have fully move of one of his legs on the Monday morning following the race. It would have been an easy decision for Bruni to not to race in Switzerland, but being the ultra competitor he is, he put in the rehab to be in a fit state to race.
Given all that context, Bruni's qualifying (where he qualified fourth) and finals run were remarkable. For finals, he was sitting in the hot-seat with with only Danny Hart, Amaury Pierron and Loris Vergier left to start. Vergier did manage to edge out Bruni in the end by two-tenths of a second to take the win, but second place probably felt like a win for Bruni given his week.
26 min
Lenzerheide downhill recap
Join us for a recap of all the men's and women's downhill racing on Lenzerheide's oppressively steep track.
04
Backing up good form at Snowshoe race 1
Two weeks on from Lenzerheide, Bruni was in the United States for a World Cup stop that would host the final two rounds (the fifth and sixth) of the 2021 series. The World Cup overall title was a bit of a distant dream and not really on Bruni's radar – another Frenchman, Thibaut Dapréla, was having a season to remember and was way ahead of second-placed Vergier and Bruni in third.
Bruni qualified the best of Vergier and Daprela for the fifth round and his two fellow Frenchmen both finished outside the top 20, meaning they would take their finals runs before Bruni. Dapréla crashed out on his run, while Vergier posted a competitive time that had him sitting in the hot-seat.
52 min
Snowshoe downhill recap
See how the 2021 UCI Mountain Bike World Cup DH overall titles were won at the Snowshoe double-header finale.
The pressure was on Bruni, but this was a Bruni happy in himself for the first time this season. He managed to beat Vergier's time by 0.5 seconds, but Bruni wouldn't take the win, as Britain's Reece Wilson managed to usurp him at the top of the podium. However, everything had gone right for Bruni in this race and he was now well and truly in the mix for the World Cup overall title, a position that was unimaginable after the first two races of the season.
05
Super Bruni perfection at the season finale
Going into this second and final race in Snowshoe, Bruni was still behind Vergier and Dapréla in the overall World Cup title battle. Dapréla had a 125-point lead over Bruni, while Vergier was 46 points ahead of Bruni. However, Dapréla wouldn’t race after crashing badly in qualifying, so it became a two-way fight for the overall with Vergier, who just needed to finish ahead of Bruni to take the title. For Bruni to take the overall he needed to win and hope that Vergier finished third or lower.
Bruni was the last man down the course these finals, so he would already know what Vergier had done before he raced himself. Vergier had a disastrous run and had placed outside the top 50 at that point, so with a clean run Bruni would win the overall. Ever the professional, Bruni was in full commitment on his run, posting the fastest time to take the win, his first of this season.
3 min
Loïc Bruni's winning run – Snowshoe race 2
Watch the winning run from Loïc Bruni at the second downhill race at Snowshoe, USA.
In a season that had been far from ideal and probably Bruni's toughest ever, there was understandable joy that he managed to take the World Cup overall title for the second time.
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