DOWNHILL WOMEN

Women’s downhill racing is great, I love it. With Rachel Atherton back in the mix, Tracy Moseley resplendent in the rainbow stripes and Sabrina Jonnier steady as a rock, it is all set to be one hell of a battle. Add in Emmeline Ragot, Floriane Pugin and Myriam Nicole and it gets even more exciting. And of course don’t forget junior rider Manon Carpenter. With the three Brits and four French (mentioned above) set for battle it is going to be like Waterloo all over again!

Sabrina just keeps storming along. Five World Cup titles now paired with two World Champs wins makes her the most decorated female racer right now. Two wins and three second places is how you sew up a title. She is highly competitive and often performs best when a challenge is set or after a particular bad qualifier. Don’t let all the pink accessories fool you, when she is angry and determined she is at her best. 2011 will not be as easy as 2010 for her, but that’s how she likes it.

Emmeline had a slow start to the ’10 season, but once she switched to the longer travel stable plough bike (Intense M9) it all clicked. She is not a precise rider, and doesn’t care about finding the smoothest lines. She points and shoots and is not afraid to get ‘ragged’ as the boys in the commentary booth like to point out. The more technical and scary the better, her two wins were chalked up at the tough tracks of Val di Sole and Champery, with a second in Leogang. See a pattern here? Still onboard an M9, now with Griffiths Racing, she will have her work cut out for her in the opening two rounds, but should come into her own mid season.

Tracy will breathe a sigh of relief now that 2010 is over. Not her best year in the World Cup series, no wins and only one late season second place finish, which was just enough to claw her way into third overall. She did however make up for it all by winning the biggest race of the year and her career at Mt Ste Anne World Champs. What’s more important when gazing into the crystal ball is keeping in mind she smashed them all with a massive seven and half second margin. That will give her massive confidence leading into the 2011 season. With plenty of time on the trail bike, winning the Urge Invitational in Cabo Verde and then racing in the gruelling eight day Cape Epic XC stage race in South Africa, she will be perfectly prepped and conditioned for pedally Pietermaritzburg and power sapping Fort William.

Four French women in the top five, this is what happens when cycling is a part of life and culture over there and not just simply a boy’s recreational past time. Floriane impressed me immensely throughout 2010. She was the only rider to be on every podium of the season, quietly and happily sliding under the radar. All she needs to add to her repertoire is a tiny bit of aggression and risk then she will be the complete package.

Nicole is the opposite of Floriane. She is all risk and aggression; the problem is it is a bit of a gamble with her, when the dice rolls in her favour she can be unbeatable, as her first place qualifying slots at Maribor and Champery showed. In undoubtedly the trickiest, muddiest and toughest conditions faced all year she won the Champery qualifier by a massive sixteen seconds. Yes sixteen seconds. To say she loves wet muddy steep technical courses would be an understatement. Hopefully she has been working on her fitness and pedaling during the off–season, if so she may soon become a safe bet.

How do I categorise Rachel Atherton? Past World Champ, yes. World Cup overall winner, yes…but those were both in 2008 and since then she has been plagued with major injuries that have forced her to skip the 2009 season entirely and half of the last year’s races. Her problems with her shoulders must really be wearing her patience thin by now, she wants to get stuck right back in but nerve damage is not that simple an injury to overcome. The fact that she can win the season opener at Maribor (with a broken finger no less) by over nine seconds is testament to her skills. Maribor is a track that rewards intuitive, flowy, natural bike handling, a skill–set you have to be born with. On the other end of the spectrum she is also mentally strong enough to find 23 seconds on a relatively simple cut and dry track like Windham between qualifiers and finals, where she surprised everyone with a spectacular comeback win. It would be good to see her put a complete season in for a change, the other girls have stepped up their game in her absence and that that will just fuel an even greater fire from within.