The 2018 Elite UCI Mountain Bike World Championships were held in Lenzerheide, Switzerland, last weekend with the final of the women’s downhill taking place on Sunday’s grand stand finale. GB rider Rachel Atherton of Trek Factory Racing took the win, earning the rainbow jersey for a fifth time and adding to her dominant 2018 World Cup overall title.
Trek rider puts unlucky 2017 season behind her
Rachel Atherton is one of the most decorated mountain bikers in the sport. With multiple National, European titles and World Cup wins on her palmarès, she is a favourite in any event she enters. However the 2017 season ended badly for Atherton where a crash in her World Championships timed training run put an end to her season with a broken collarbone and ruptured shoulder ligaments. This was particularly tough for Atherton – she had just battled back from a serious shoulder injury 3 months earlier following a crash at the Fort William World Cup in June.
The 2018 season saw her return as strong as ever. It’s generally accepted that if Atherton is fit and stays upright she’s most likely to finish on the podium, and exactly that happened at the UK National Downhill, Crankworx and UCI World Cup events.
All season long Atherton was pushed by her British compatriot Tahnee Seagrave and the World Championships proved no different, with them qualifying 1-2 in front of record crowds. On a fast, flowing final run in dry and dusty conditions in the Swiss Alps, the French trio of Morgane Charre, Marine Cabirou and Myriam Nicole set progressively faster times, with Nicole taking the lead time down to 3.26. Seagrave then put in a scorching run but could still only take 0.7 seconds off Nicole’s time.
Atherton set off at a searing pace, clearly on a different level. She was three seconds ahead at the first split, six seconds up at the second, and a barely believable 9.98 seconds up by the finish.
"It hasn't really sunk in yet," said Atherton. "I knew it was going to be a hard race and that I had to be fast. All the way down I thought I was going to crash. Coming into the finish, I could hear the announcer saying I was the 2018 world champion, and I just had to push right to the end. It's hard, because we train earlier in the day when the light is different, so it was hard to see the lines during the race."
A bike fit for a world champion
Rachel Atherton rides a Trek Session 9.9, Trek’s carbon fibre downhill rig. The bike is finished with a Fox Factory suspension package, with a Kashima-coated 40 fork on the front and a coil-sprung X2 on the back. The all-important stopping power is looked after by Hope’s powerful quad-piston Tech 3 V4 brakes with matching floating rotors and Hope Pro4 hubs laced to Bontrager Line Pro 30 rims. SRAM’s dedicated 7-speed X01 DH components and a Renthal cockpit completes the build.
“I feel so comfortable on this bike,†says Atherton. “It’s important so you can bang out those runs and, hopefully, get up to race speed!â€
Trek’s range
While the Session range of full suspension downhill bikes is not presently in stock at Bicycle Chain, there’s plenty of other Trek kit to get you going. When not training or racing on her mountain bike, Rachel Atherton likes to supplement her programme with a bit of off-season road riding. As a Trek athlete, her road bike of choice is the endurance machine of cobbled classic fame, the Trek Domane. But if you want to stick to the rough and tough terrain of the woods and trail, we’ve got some of Trek’s best cross-country bikes to keep you shredding this winter.
For our full range of full suspension mountain bikes from all our brands, click here. If you’ve got any questions about our range or are unsure of where to start, our in-store staff are always on hand to help you out.
