Haley Batten Makes History with USA’s Best XC Olympic Finish

America invented mountain biking 40 years ago when hippies and hipsters took to fat-tire racing on fire roads in California and Colorado, but it wasn’t until Sunday that a U.S. racer won silver in the Olympic Games.

Haley Batten, born in 1998, battled back from a broken wheel early in Sunday’s thrilling race won by an untouchable Pauline Ferrand-Prévot to finish second, the best by a U.S. rider in cross-country since MTB became a medal sport in 1996.

“I visualized finishing with the medal around my neck for a long time,” Batten said. “So I know it feels like something special, but I can’t explain how amazing this is.”

It must feel historic.

Her silver is the first U.S. Olympic medal in cross-country since Georgia Gould was third in 2012 London. Mountain bike pioneer Susan DeMattei also won bronze in the inaugural Olympics in 1996.

No American male has won an Olympic mountain bike medal.

It almost didn’t happen.

Broken Wheel but not Broken Dreams

Batten destroyed her front wheel on one of the early laps and ceded valuable terrain after making a wheel change.

“I got a flat tire and destroyed my front wheel and I think I had the fastest wheel change ever,” she said. “I knew the start was important. And I messed it up. That was really disappointing and I thought I lost my chance of a medal right there. I stayed calm.”

Batten raced on the Elancourt Hill course before and knew that the mix of fast gravel-like tracks and the technical berms, jumps, rock gardens, and drops were in her wheelhouse.

She started picking off groups of riders in her comeback without giving up hope.

Up the trail, France’s Loana Lecomte crashed heavily and was knocked unconscious while riding in the bronze medal position behind Ferrand Prévot. She suffered a concussion and a jaw injury, but was not otherwise seriously injured.

Puck Pieterse (Netherlands) looked to have a lock on silver at about 1 minute behind Ferrand-Prévot when she suffered a puncture midway through the race.

That gave Batten, who found an ally in 2016 Olympic champion Jenny Rissveds (Sweden), the opening she needed.

The pair worked together to move up into the podium places in the closing laps and fended off a resurgent Pieterse, who finished fourth, and Evie Richards (United Kingdom) in fifth.

“Me and Jenny have been racing every single race this year. She’s made me a better athlete,” she said. “I knew when we were together in those last few laps, I knew it’d be really really hard to beat her.

“I put my whole heart and soul in today’s race and I knew after she gave a couple of really big attacks that she might be burning a little bit too many matches,” she said. “My legs never hurt for some reason. I just I don’t know I just wanted it so so bad.”

Threat of a Protest Doesn’t Cast a Pall

The race wasn’t without controversy.

A frustrated Pieterse crossed the finish line in fourth just 21 seconds out of the medals, and she approached third-place Rissveds at the line. What did she ask?

“She asked if I was going to protest the medal,” Rissveds said.

What was the issue?

Batten was spotted racing through the technical zone on the final lap without taking a water bottle or receiving technical assistance, something that the race jury noticed.

After the race, Dutch officials wanted to protest to the UCI, but race rules do not allow a formal protest, Wielerflits reported.

Velo asked Batten after the press conference if there was a threat of losing the medal?

“I don’t know if there’s a protest, we’ll see,” she said.

At the finish line, journalists asked Batten why she did not grab a water bottle, as UCI rules suggest.

“No, I did not grab a water bottle,” she said, with the American flag draped across her shoulders. When asked if she was supposed to, she replied, “I have no idea. I was in the moment.”

Media reports stated afterwards that she was handed a 500 CHF fine for ‘failure to respect the instructions of the race organisation or commissaires (using the pit lane without feeding or heaving technical assistance).’

USA Cycling officials confirmed that no formal protest was filed and that the silver medal — and the historic result — stand.

For Batten, her personal mountain bike and Olympic journey began in 2012, the last time an American won a mountain bike medal.

“That was the year that I decided I wanted to be an Olympian because of her,” she said of Gould’s medal in 2012. “I just won my first junior national title and Georgia is the reason why I’m here today.”

With one eye on the 2028 Los Angeles Olympic Games, Batten is hoping to emulate Ferrand-Prévot, who was untouchable on a triumphant victory on home roads.

An American gold on American dirt in an American Olympics: there’d be no better way to write more history.