The Secret World of the Female Mountain Biker!

This article has been provided by Gill Harris, with pictures from: Rutger Pauw/Red Bull Content Pool.

This year there has been plenty of talk of an upsurge of interest in Downhill Mountain biking. From females no less! But with few Downhill races attracting more than 15-20 female racers across all categories many have dismissed it as a vicious rumour.

Until now. The first ever Red Bull Female Foxhunt in Edinburgh, UK attracted 150 entrants who were chased down a Scottish hillside by Rachel Atherton, 2013 World Champion and a passionate advocate for bringing women into the sport.

The race was a mass-start event that felt more like a festival with teepees, music and yoga as well as an awful lot of coaching and mutual support. Seasoned racers and first-timers flocked in from Liverpool, London, Rotterdam and Belfast as well as a strong local contingent. There were mothers riding with daughters, teenagers and riders in their fifties. They came with friends, families or they came alone, but nobody stayed alone for long as they were swept up in the incredible atmosphere of “The friendliest Mountain bike event ever.”

We chatted to some of the riders about their experiences of riding and racing, some of the barriers they have overcome and their aspirations for introducing more women to the sport.

One of the youngest riders on the start grid was 14 year old Maya Atkinson. Maya was born in Australia but now lives in Plymouth, England. She’s already a veteran of mini DH and the Juvenile British Downhill Series. Like most of the riders we met, Maya started riding because somebody close to her rode, in this case her mum Sovanchan and dad Andrew. None of Maya’s school-friends ride though she’s made new friends at races. “My school-friends aren’t into it, they think it looks manly and it’s too scary” said Maya.

Sov was also racing today though she’s stopped racing “real” races because she gets too nervous. Nerves were a recurring theme and a possible key to why this particular event held so much appeal.

Abby Humphries, 25 was racing for the second time. Abby said “I was quite sure that there wasn’t ever going to be a second time!” My first race last March was an absolute disaster, in fact I pulled out after seeding. It was all so horrible. I’d signed up for a UK Gravity Enduro race and because it was my first competition I started right at the back – except for Liz Simmons last year’s series winner who decided to start behind me. Well, she was behind me for the short time until I crashed… then they started the Junior Men with hardly any gap. They were really fast and the pressure really got to me, all I could hear the whole way down was “Rider!” and spectators yelling at me to get out of the way. I got down to the bottom and then I just cried. I pulled out of the race and I couldn’t even look at my bike for about three weeks.

This feels different, it’s so chilled and about a hundred times more inclusive. Lately I’ve just been riding for fun again and the event today feels like a natural progression from that. I’m lucky that where I live there’s a really strong  Mountain Bike community, recently I’ve been trying to get more girls out on their bikes and we had our first girl’s ride a few weeks ago. Five or six of us got together and it was great, a bit more mellow than riding with guys who never want to stop! I was the youngest in the group by quite a bit and getting a time when people could come was a logistical nightmare , there were loads more women interested in coming out with us but they just couldn’t get childcare or get away from the practical stuff they needed to do.

Twins Natalie Shearing and Nicola Johnson (37) agree with Abby. “ Women don’t necessarily have the time to ride. Divesting yourself of home and family responsibility for a couple of hours can be as emotionally difficult as it is practically. When it comes to racing 10% of the field is female because only 10% of women have got the necessary combination of desire, belief and the practical support that allows it to happen. Which is a huge shame because nothing makes you progress as fast as racing does“ says Nicola. Natalie takes up the baton,” A lot of women just don’t back themselves enough. Society drives this perception that women should be feminine and that wanting to win isn’t feminine. There is a poverty of aspiration around what young girls could be. Look who the media put up there as role models, Kim Kardashian and the Big Brother posse, we’re teaching youngsters to aspire to be useless human beings when there is absolutely no excuse for that, especially in the UK when Rachel and Manon Carpenter and Tahnee Seagrave blocked out the World Champs podium and we have Jess Ennis and Paula Radcliffe blazing a trail for women’s sport  but the level of coverage is minute in comparison to what some reality TV star is doing in her lovelife.

We both voted for Rachel in the BTSport Action Woman awards and we got everyone in our cycling club to vote too, It’s up to everyone who rides to be active in raising the profile of our sport. And Rachel deserves it, she has dominated the sport this last few years and has changed the paradigm of what we expect of our female athletes,  it’s awesome to be able to ride with her at something like this.

Abby agrees. “Rachel isn’t an icon because she’s pretty; she is of course but what’s more important is that she’s strong, and determined and that she finds such great lines and rides fantastically difficult tracks. She’s mentally strong as well, she proved it again this season the way she came back from illness, I was literally yelling at my computer screen, wanting her to win.”

Debby Claus from the Netherlands adds “And she has a funny accent and is always sporting to the other competitors, I’m a huge fan!  I ride for fun usually but I already have three bikes ( a GT La Bomba, my Cube Hanzz and a Cube XC bike) so it’s a hobby already out of control…”

Yvonne Hay is 30, she’s coming back from injury herself so has spent a lot of time marshalling this season, “I’d definitely recommend getting involved with marshalling, it’s a great way to get to know the racers and there’s a real community feel.”

In common with many of the women we spoke to Yvonne has been put off downhill racing by the memberships needed, the paperwork and high entry fees.  “For Endurance events you can just rock up so I’ve done a load of them – even though I don’t like pedaling uphill!  I’ve done some dual slaloms too but my husband ran me off the course when I overtook him! In one of my first ever races he shouted at me and I fell off! Generally though I’d say that riding with men is a great way to progress, especially if they are like the group I ride with and they refuse to wait. They make me do all my own trail mechanics too, it’s a group rule and an important one I think.  Being able to look after your own bike is one of the things that will help male riders to accept women on equal terms. I’m pretty confident about maintaining my bike even though my husband is a bike mechanic so it would be easy to dodge the issue, I’ll make sure my daughter learns to look after her own bike as well. She’s seven and I’ll admit I was delighted when she was watching Fort William Downhill World Cup for the first time and she asked “How old do I have to be to enter that competition?” Just think what would happen if there were as many kids watching Downhill on TV as there are watching football…that’s why media coverage is going to be vital to how things develop, Olympic status would transform the sport.

Gillian Galbraith is riding with her 16 year old daughter Zoe who has to miss most of practice to go to her Saturday job!! Gillian is full of praise for Foxhunt “The whole concept is so accessible both in terms of ability and practically, I’m a bit of a scaredy cat but I’m riding to support Zoe and because I wont be constantly having to be moving aside to let men through! Zoe really wants to race now and I’ll do everything I can to support her but it is a big commitment for parents of the youngsters coming through.

That the weekend was a massive success is beyond question, it seems appropriate to give the final word to the “Fox” who inspired it all. Rachel Atherton said “I am so stoked, I’ve been shouting about getting more girls into riding and racing for a few years now and suddenly it feels like there are at least another hundred and fifty voices added to that campaign! This has been the first Female Foxhunt from Red Bull but it definitely won’t be the last!

Talking to a lot of the women and girls here today has made me realize again how very lucky I was to have two big brothers who encouraged me to ride with them. Almost everybody here has started riding because of a brother, or a husband or a boyfriend who rides, that’s awesome. I want to challenge all the guys out there to take your girl riding. There’s a guy here called Dale from Belfast who’s missing the last race of his Irish Downhill Mountainbike Series to bring his missus here this weekend, he’s got his little girl in a front carrier and he rides red trails with her on there, he definitely gets the Most Supportive Male prize! But it’s also massively encouraging to see mums riding with their daughters and to hear about groups like Hervelo – if everyone woman here brought a friend next year how mega would that be? “