Rachel Atherton Confirms: She Will Race Leogang

Was anyone else not the least bit surprised to see her win last week? She’s never really had to compete with anyone but herself, she’s always been head and shoulders above the whole field. Whatever she has is about much more than just fitness and it won’t just disappear. Clearly not yet anyway.

Was anyone else not the least bit surprised to see her win last week?

Yes, me 😀

I thought she’d be competitive, but was surprised to see her win. The female field is about as strong as I’ve ever seen it. Camile, Vali, Nina, gracey helmstreet are all shredders. You’ve then got Tahnee and Marine coming back into the series from their respective challenges. Pheobe Gale will win a race either this year or next, and Monika Hrastnik is due a result.

Incredibly impressive for Rachel to come back in and do that.

Yep, surprised and delighted!

Coming back after a serious injury and then having a baby. More of a mental challenge than a physical one, possibly.

She is a tough & talented individual , comes in part from sibling rivalry / support and upbringing I suspect.

She is quite refreshingly open about the challenges and struggles of having a baby and how much having Dyfi and family to hand has helped.

Yes, me

Me Too, looking at the splits Rachel was really slowing up by the end of her run, she just doesn’t have the stamina, which isn’t surprising as she’s done so little training. She did all the hard work at the top of the course, Nina and Camille were coming for her pretty fast at the last splits. Leogang’s a whole minute longer. It will be interesting

Yup i was quite shocked… i optimistically thought top 3… but i never thought she’d win it.

Hugely impressive though.

The female field is about as strong as I’ve ever seen it.

This may be an unpopular question, but is it?

Or rather, is it as strong as it used to be compared to the men’s field?

I was wondering about this today so I was going back and having a look at the Anne Caroline Chausson era, specifically where the women’s winner would have placed if she raced in the men’s field.  Just at a glance, the winner used to finish middle of the bottom half  of the men’s race.

It’s been a while since I’ve seen a winning woman’s time that would beat anyone other than the crash/major mechanical riders in the men’s field.

Several things could be wrong with my analysis.  ACC could have just been a freak of nature (although other women would have also ended up mid-pack in the men’s).  It could be that the men’s field is now simply so strong that the women’s advances aren’t keeping pace.  It could also be the courses are simply built to suit men (or rather, built to suit people who can ride the biggest bike possible which is another thing).

Anyway, it was awesome what Rachel did and it was amazing to see, but it doesn’t do anything to quiet my fears that women’s DH is actually drifting backwards relative to the men’s.  If Amoury or Loic or pretty much anyone stopped racing for 3 years I absolutely guarantee they would not win first time back.  Sam Hill couldn’t even qualify.

I’ll maybe do some analysis later and see if I can quantify how things have changed over the years (assuming they have and I didn’t pick out some freak results to look at).

Was anyone else not the least bit surprised to see her win last week?

The female field is about as strong as I’ve ever seen it.

Yes I was surprised to see her win, given the fact that she hasnt raced in 2 years, had an injury that would finish most people, and as she has said herself, she isnt fit.

Doesnt really say much for the quality of the womens field unfortunately.

Good on her though

I’m not sure the courses when ACC was riding were anything like what they are now were they? And the men’s racing is just so strong now that the top 10 and often top 20 men are separated be just 10’s of seconds.  Plus, I’m not sure that comparing women’s racing to men’s and judging their performance on that criteria does much for equality?

This may be an unpopular question, but is it?

That depends how you look at it..

This may be an interesting one, certainly is for me. But the difference between females and even young lads is fairly dramatic.
Fort William, the winner of the 13-14 boys beat Nina Hoffman. Admittedly only by 3s… but he still beat her.

If Nina had raced in the 15-16 Youth cat… she’d have been 6th. Winner beat her by 27sec.

Currently i think the female field is not that strong. You see it all through the racing.. This weekend at MIJ there were about 160 males vs 11 females racing… Which is why it’s not as strong as I’d like to see it, there’s just not many of them who race sadly.

The first thing we really need to do is stop comparing the times with the men’s.

The racing is tighter than it ever has been. Before Rachel’s ankle went, it was  fairly common to see the women’s winner clear by several seconds. She may not have quite regained the strength that she had in her prime, that doesn’t detract from the effort made by Camille or Nina preparing for this season, especially on a three minute track.

Doesnt really say much for the quality of the womens field unfortunately.

Or suggests that Rachel is a contender for GOAT. the UCI has done women’s DH no favours though, the fields for Juniors is teeny, the scoring for Elites has been reduced from 10-15 place, and outside of that you score no points at all so what would be the point of competing? Compare the depth of the field to the XCC and XCO and it’s night and day.

Bringing youth categories into the comparison doesn’t help either – some lads of 13, 14 or 15 can be 6ft+ and built like tanks. One of my nephews is 15 and 6’2″, another one is just 15, 5’10” but rows and is a triangle with an eight-pack

Physiology and lever length make a massive difference. It’s often why I’m seriously impressed by the women’s performances on brutal tracks. Think Mont StAnne, it’s fast, has some huge hucks, and then throws in a brutal rock garden when they’re already up to their eyeballs in lactic. Anyone who gets down that in a competitive time for their class is doing seriously well

Bringing youth categories into the comparison doesn’t help either – some lads of 13, 14 or 15 can be 6ft+ and built like tanks. One of my nephews is 15 and 6’2″, another one is just 15, 5’10” but rows and is a triangle with an eight-pack

I hear you… Mine is still 14 and 5’10 and carved out of stone… but he’s still slower than some tiny little lads. But it’s a fair point. The winner of the 15-16 at Fort William and the 2 fast Frenchies could pass for 20 😀

@weeksy – I do think you’ve got a point about the participation numbers. Whilst the women’s topflight is as competitive as I’ve seen it, we’re still talking less than ten riders, the men’s has 30+ realistically fighting for the podium. At grass roots you’re seeing it when you go racing with your lad and that stat of 160 vs 11 is showing why there isn’t the throughput.

Shirley comparisons to the men’s field aren’t relevant. The strength of the women’s field is the comparison to each other. Nobody is winning by minutes, it’s all fairly close, with anyone winning on any given, err, Saturday.

You wouldn’t call touring cars a poor field based on the speed of F1 cars?

I’m not sure what the answer is though. This weekend at Southern Enduro the ratio is probably not that different between male and female racers… Some Enduros have a few more as some girls race Eebs… but without sounding too sexist here, quite often a girl can get a podium just by turning up and riding down. Whereas often the lads will need to beat 30+ on the same race day.

In the Nationals Fort William they had to group the girls 13-16 and there was still only 9 in it… In the boys they had over 120 in the same age range.
17-18 they had 6…
19+ they had 7.

I’d LOVE to know how to get more females racing.. i love seeing them race.. Especially when i think “yeah i’m OK….” and my boys team-mate who’s 15 year old girl kicks my backside LOL… it puts me right in my place. The girls are ace and it’s brilliant seeing them around the paddock.

@nickc

Plus, I’m not sure that comparing women’s racing to men’s and judging their performance on that criteria does much for equality?

/sigh

I knew someone would get butthurt about that. He was comparing winning times for women based on where they’d previously come against the men – halfway down the bottom half.   Nowadays, they don’t make it that high up the field.

That’s nothing to do with equality – that’s a simple measure of performance.  That an out-of-fitness Atherton has come back and stormed it (despite not really racing since 2019 – so four years) then got off the bike and put her kid on her tit, says to me that the women’s field isn’t as competitive as it used to be.

But well done Rachel.  Think it’s great to have her back.  Hope she’s considering doing the full season now tbh – I bet a lot depends on how she does at the next race.

Hope she’s considering doing the full season now tbh – I bet a lot depends on how she does at the next race.

You’d imagine even if she makes a top 3, she’ll be sitting there thinking “there’s not that many races this year, i could even sneak an Overall here” add to that the fact the Worlds are on a course she knows well at Fort William.. so maybe another world title… It’s got to be tempting for her i’d expect.

Plus, I’m not sure that comparing women’s racing to men’s and judging their performance on that criteria does much for equality?

What I’m interested in is the direction of travel.  Are women getting faster relative to men or slower?

If the gap is closing then great, it’s a strong indication that the sport is moving in the right direction.

If it’s not, as I suspect, then why is that happening?   Are the courses being tailored towards a particular type of rider at the expense of equally but differently skilled riders?  Are women being disproportionately disadvantaged by this?

Or is it just that fewer and fewer women are deciding to compete in DH racing and the reduced talent pool and reduced competition between riders is harming the sport?

I don’t think that asking if there is an issue and then trying to figure out what the issue is can be bad for equality.  The opposite, really.

Maybe young girls just don’t aspire to be DH racers, and who can blame them? It’s bloody stupid.

I’m at the age where I’m transitioning from thinking that going very fast on a bike is the coolest thing ever, to thinking it’s a massively risky undertaking for no real reward, other than the admiration of other hyperactive young men.

and who can blame them? It’s bloody stupid.

Amen to that 😀

Bloody fun though.

I’m at the age where I’m transitioning from thinking that going very fast on a bike is the coolest thing ever, to thinking it’s a massively risky undertaking for no real reward, other than the admiration of other hyperactive young men

I hear you… i’m basically sitting at races now with a number on and thinking “why the hell am i doing this”.. Some of me has ‘something to prove’ but who the hell i’m proving it to.. i don’t know.

Of course there is the other side to this, if the Atherton bike is as awsomes as they say it is, its no wonder she won 🙂

Maybe its a fast bike for women and not men?

I still think what she said at the end did a lot to harm the sport. ie you can just turn up to win a DH World Cup, and I’ve not trained enough, but what the heck I will decide if I want to do more in the next few days. Other pro sports you couldnt do that on so many levels

Having seen her run and the fade in performance towards the bottom, when Ms Atherton is fully fit it will be epic.

Are women being disproportionately disadvantaged by this?

I think there’s an element to this. Junior women are being asked to do the same drops, jumps and step ups and so on that the Elite men are, and the courses have certainly got more and more technically and mentally demanding. Watch the PinkBike racing series and the struggle Aimi Kenyon has. She spends a good deal of her practice just working out how to ride the course in one go, let alone work out where to go faster.

I still think what she said at the end did a lot to harm the sport. ie you can just turn up to win a DH World Cup, and I’ve not trained enough, but what the heck I will decide if I want to do more in the next few days.

we’ve all been at school with the kid who barely turns up, claims to have done no revision, then gets straight A’s

I still think what she said at the end did a lot to harm the sport. ie you can just turn up to win a DH World Cup, and I’ve not trained enough, but what the heck I will decide if I want to do more in the next few days. Other pro sports you couldnt do that on so many levels

She’s not wrong though is she? That’s exactly what she did and everyone knows it.

There’s just not the depth of talent in women’s DH and there never has been. There’s fewer than 10 women in the world who can do a proper, convincingly fast run on a world cup track and they’re never all racing at the same time.

I agree that’s it’s ‘felt’ more competitive in recent seasons and it’s been more fun to watch but it’s only because the boss was at home resting her leg and playing with her kid.

Is it not more relevant to compare current women’s times to past women’s times? Fort bill for example can’t have changed so much that it can’t give a reasonable idea of how much faster the field is getting? If you want a baseline to account for bike improvements, compare to how much men have improved in the same time period

Mind you, I doubt any of us could get within 28 seconds of Jordan Williams, so there is that

you can just turn up to win a DH World Cup, and I’ve not trained enough

You can then milk it for the following 25 years and get a nice gig commentating… 😉

I think there’s an element to this. Junior women are being asked to do the same drops, jumps and step ups and so on that the Elite men are, and the courses have certainly got more and more technically and mentally demanding. Watch the PinkBike racing series and the struggle Aimi Kenyon has.

i think this is the key point. Since the ACC days, courses have become more ‘man made’ for want of a better word. And they are made for the top 20 men.
I don’t mean it’s bike-parky, I mean there are doubles, gaps and so on that are meant/built for the elite men. There’s an aspect of burst strength that will always favour the men.
On an old school kind of track, if you’re 95% as strong/fit you go 95% as fast.
These days if being 5% slower means you can’t clear a double or gap over some obstacle; that is a massive hinderance. Not only are you losing time there, there’s speed lost for the upcoming high speed section.

since we are talking about Rachael, the drop where she broke her Achilles at Les gets. I’ve seen that drop. I’ve ridden to the top of it and looked down in awe. I wouldn’t even ride what was taped as the chicken run in the race. In the womens race, only a handful did it. In the mens race, everyone did it, and some fag packet maths suggested that (looking at the time penalty taking the chicken line gave you) the fastest male qualifier, had they chosen to ride around that one feature on the otherwise fastest run, would have seen them outside the top 60.

Imagine taking a modern DH bike down a 90’s style fire road pedal fest. I wouldn’t watch that. You can’t start dumbing the tracks down to suit the riders (of any gender) with the lowest ability. That’s what chicken lines are for. Yes they’re slower. If they weren’t it would just be ‘the line’.

I don’t think anyone is suggesting that are they? We’re just saying these tracks are physically and mentally demanding and it’s showing in the times in comparison to the women of 20 years ago.

Let’s all be honest though, Rachel Atherton at 3/4 fitness is probably better than anyone on here.

the top half of her run looked so much smoother and ‘slower’ than the previous riders even though she was up at every split. I’m sure some of that is the bike, some of it is over 20 years of  riding at the pointy end of DH and some is just that her off season would have been spent at Dyfi riding with some slacker called Dan.

and Rachel didn’t say she hadn’t trained, just that she hadn’t trained as much as she would have liked. And the Atherton’s have been very very fit and train very hard for years. Even back in the days when it was ok to have a few pints between qualifying and race day

Let’s all be honest though, Rachel Atherton at 3/4 fitness is probably better than anyone on here.

rachel could have beaten everyone on here the day after she gave birth without breaking a sweat

Let’s all be honest though, Rachel Atherton at 3/4 fitness is probably better than anyone on here.

I’ll go out on a limb here and say every woman in the race is going to be miles better than every single stw poster

Doesn’t negate Bruce’s point that there is perhaps a bit of a dearth of talent in the woman’s field when you look at it in context of them being the best riders in the world. I can’t think of many sports where someone can win at world level having returned after 3 years unprepared as she did

thats aside, shes still bloody awesome!

Apart from GW, obvs.

I’ll go out on a limb here and say every woman in the race is going to be miles better than every single stw poster

I’ve ridden with a woman that has had some top ten Jr DH at Worlds and Elite results at national/continental level.

She’s plenty quick. I have mates with faster Strava times on her local tracks, but not many.

I’ve also ridden with a top 10 national male Enduro rider and World Series qualifier – he’s on another level, I couldn’t get close enough to see how he was going so fast!

I’ll go out on a limb here and say every woman in the race is going to be miles better than every single stw poster

There’s no need to be silly. Not everyone here is a canal path bimbler.

I think that Rachel is an exceptional athlete and the women’s field is pretty strong at the moment. She didn’t win easily. There have been some good women for a while but more in the last few years, and while Rachel was racing full time they were racing for 2nd. Hopefully more successful, exciting racing from the women will encourage more girls to take it up. But it is dangerous too dangerous even for talents like Manon Carpenter, anyway don’t overthink it and enjoy the spectacle I reckon.

I’m really excited that Atherton will be racing more this season.  Watching her win at the weekend was genuinely emotional for me — I’m not sure why exactly but I was entirely made up to see it, it was an incredible moment.

Beyond that, I think Rachel racing again will make for interesting viewing at Leogang. It doesn’t feel quite so certain that she’ll blast everyone off the track in the same way it was when she was on her mad winning streak. As someone else already noted Rachel’s blistering pace for the first half of the Lenzerheide run had dropped off significantly toward the bottom — was that a tactical move or was she struggling with fitness? We can only guess, as can the rest of the field.

So how will it go at Leogang? It’s a longer track, which may be bad news if Atherton was struggling with fitness. On the other hand, although the track is longer, it has quite a big chunk of fairly non-tech* jumpy-swoopy stuff at the top which may be less taxing physically. And it looks as though it’s likely to be fairly wet, which may just play into the hands of someone who lives and rides in Wales when it comes to dealing with that greasy horrible steep wooded section in the middle of the course…

* Relatively non-tech, pedants. I’m not riding any of it, so this is purely an armchair spectator judgement.