Rachel Atherton: The Trek Session 9.9

The other big talk of the 2015 off-season was the Atherton’s defection from GT to Trek. Rachel Atherton clearly didn’t struggle with the transition. Her winning season will go down in history and has not only made waves in the mountain bike world, but attracted a welcome heap of attention from the mainstream media as well.

Rachel’s Trek is a standard large Session 9.9 carbon frame. The front centre has been extended 6mm with a special headset. Rachel runs the Fox DHX2 coil-sprung rear shock and Fox Float Factory 40 fork. Both fork and shock are production versions, though with some custom tunes.

Danny Hart: The Mondraker Summum

Aaron Gwin may have won the overall this season but Danny Hart won the hearts of the downhill faithful – as well as back to back to back World Cup stages and a second World Championship of course.

Danny rides a stock size large carbon fibre Mondraker Summum frame. He doesn’t run offset shock bushings or alter the headset on the bike. Hart uses the Fox 40 Air fork and DHX2 rear shock with a 425lb/in spring, after changing from Marzocchi to Fox Racing Shox this year.

Mondraker will have left the World Champs grinning after Hart was joined in the top three by Laurie Greenland and Florent Payet, also on the Summum.

Tracey Hannah: The Polygon Collosus

Tracey Hannah finished just 10 points behind Manon Carpenter in the overall world cup standings this year. She and her brother Mick Hannah ride the Polygon Collosus.

The Hannah’s will be back out in Indonesia soon to work on the Collosus on the off-season and try and improve on a good year on the bike.

Greg Minnaar: The Santa Cruz V10

Greg Minnaar never fails to live up to his reputation. He has more wins under his belt than any other man in downhill history, and proved he’s not done with yet another win at Fort William earlier in the year.

Greg rides a custom size XXL Santa Cruz V10. As well as Josh Bryceland and Steve Peat, Luca Shaw, part of the ‘SRAM | Troy Lee Designs’ race team also runs on the V10, and Shaw too claimed a top 10 overall finish this year.

Connor Fearon: The Kona Supreme Operator

It was a good season for Connor Fearon, who racked up five top 10 finishes in the seven World Cup stops. Connor has been charging on a Kona Supreme Operator and is one of few on the circuit who still uses flat pedals.

Tahnee Seagrave: The Transition TR500

It’s not been long since Tahnee Seagrave got off the Devinci Wilson and climbed onto the Transition TR500, but there’s plenty from the past season for the 21 year old to be happy about.

Tahnee finished fourth in the overall rankings when all was said and done, but she’s shown huge signs of intent; three second-place finishes, a third, fourth and a fifth to be exact. Tahnee also won qualifying in Lourdes and in Lenzerheide. We can’t wait to see how she gets on next year.

That podium finish in Scotland was the first for the Scott Gambler, a bike which has no problem ploughing through the rocks, root and dirt around the world. Brayton will be looking to build on from here and become a regular top 10 rider.