Haley Batten Wins Team USA’s First Olympic Silver Medal in Mountain Biking

PARIS — Mountain biking is an unpredictable sport. Tires go flat, wheels break, riders crash on technical rocky sections.

Haley Batten has suffered all those fates — including in the 2024 Olympic mountain bike competition. But the 25-year-old two-time Olympian overcame a broken wheel to win a silver medal, finishing just under three minutes behind Pauline Ferrand-Prévot, a four-time Olympian, five-time world champion, and now an Olympic champion.

“That was incredible,” Batten said after the race. “As all athletes know in high performance, being able to perform on one day is really challenging. Everybody here at the Olympics is the best in the world, everybody is strong, everybody is fit, everybody’s well prepared, can ride at their best.

“For me, to mentally be able to have a clear mind and be ready to race at my best regardless of challenges before the race and during the race, it was amazing.”

It’s the third Olympic medal won by Team USA since women’s mountain biking made its Olympic debut in 1996 and the first silver medal. Susan DeMattei won bronze at the 1996 Games, and Georgia Gould took bronze in 2012.

Batten was also thrilled to have family and friends cheering her along the course. In Tokyo, Olympians raced in front of empty stands. The only witnesses to their greatness were masked reporters. Batten finished ninth in women’s mountain biking in Tokyo.

In Paris, she had their support.

“To have my family here to truly experience what the Olympics is and to share this moment with me is so special,” she said. “I saw them before the start of the race. They mean everything. They make this possible, and I'm so grateful for them. So to share not just these moments, but all the challenges in between …”

Those challenges started last season when Batten crashed and hit her head. She won a bronze medal at 2022 world championships and hoped to add to her medal collection at 2023 worlds. But the crash gave her a concussion, and she was sidelined for over five weeks, missing worlds.

“It was a bit scary,” Batten admitted. “Concussions are sometimes one of the more scary injuries. If you break a bone you know what the recovery is. But when you hurt your head, your perception of reality changes a lot. In your ability to experience life changes drastically. It's definitely scary.”

Uncertain when she would recover, Batten questioned if she should continue with her mountain biking career. was it worth it?

“To overcome that one was hard,” she said.

Then in a test event on the 2024 Olympic mountain bike course on Elancourt Hill outside Paris in May, Batten crashed again. During practice, she crashed again, hitting her head. This time, she recognized the concussion symptoms and backed off immediately.

“I took five days off the bike, I didn't ride at all, and luckily I think that midseason break was valuable for my rest and recovery in general,” she said.

With three world cup wins this season and five other podium finishes, Batten came to Paris as the top ranked female mountain biker in the world — a favorite to win an Olympic gold medal. That looked unlikely when France’s Ferrand-Prévot got an early lead that she continued building, winning her first Olympic gold medal on the eve of her retirement.

Behind her, Batten battled in a group of four women sitting in fourth through seventh places. Just as the group caught Ferrand-Prévot’s teammate Loana Lacomte, Batten was forced to make a pitstop. Her wheel had broken.

“This course, is relentless,” explained Batten. “There are sneaky rocks that can give you a flat tire. I broke my wheel today, somewhere I can't remember where, I think it was maybe lap four. You have to adapt from all the unpredictable circumstances and just race your best and try not to make mistakes.”

With a new wheel, Batten chased relentlessly and moved into medal contention with Swedish rider Jenny Rissveds (2016 Olympic gold medalist) just as Lacomte crashed and Puck Pieterse, a Dutch rider who had been sitting securely in second place for most of the race, suffered a flat tire. On the last lap, Batten gapped Rissveds and crossed the line for silver.

Batten was happy for Ferrand-Prévot finally winning an Olympic medal and in front of a home crowd — a French rider winning at a French Olympic Games. When asked if she might do the same at the Los Angeles Olympic Games in four years, Batten was not quite ready to look ahead.

“It was amazing to see Pauline win here, and the next one's mine,” said Batten. “As athletes, we're always thinking in the future, we're always preparing for big goals. But right now, I'm in the moment. I have prepared for a long time for this one, and I'm going to enjoy it.”

Then she added, “But yeah, to have the Olympics in your home country is absolutely incredible, and I think it's an even the bigger goal.”

An award-winning freelance writer based in Vermont, Peggy Shinn is in Paris covering her eighth Olympic Games. She has contributed to TeamUSA.org since its inception in 2008.