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1
John Tomac
Born
Cross-country and downhill. In the early 1990s Tomac won World Cup races and world championship medals in both disciplines, sometimes in the same season, on bikes with little or no suspension. Before the sport split into specialists, he showed that one rider's handling could cover both a climbing race and a timed descent.
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Missy Giove
Downhill. Giove won the 1994 world downhill title and a string of World Cup races and overall titles in the 1990s, riding with a full-commitment style that made her one of the sport's first stars. Her runs set the pace for how aggressively women's downhill would be raced.
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Nicolas Vouilloz
Born
Downhill. The Frenchman won ten world downhill titles across junior and elite ranks in the 1990s and early 2000s, and was known for smooth, precise lines rather than wild speed. He later raced rallies and enduro, so his line choice has been tested on two wheels and four.
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Anne-Caroline Chausson
Born
Downhill, dual and four-cross, then BMX. Chausson dominated women's gravity racing from the mid-1990s with a large haul of world titles, then won Olympic BMX gold in 2008. Her control over jumps and berms carried across three different gravity formats.
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Steve Peat
Born
Downhill. The Sheffield rider won 17 World Cup races and finally the world title in 2009 at 35, after years of near misses. His tall, loose style on steep, rooty tracks was the model for a generation of British downhillers, and his long wait for the rainbow jersey is part of downhill folklore.
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Sam Hill (cyclist)
Born
Downhill, then enduro. Hill won world downhill titles in 2006 and 2007 with a flat-pedal, inside-line style that looked different from everyone else's, then switched to enduro and won the overall Enduro World Series several times. Few riders have been the best in two gravity disciplines.
More about Sam Hill (cyclist)7
Greg Minnaar
Born
Downhill. The South African won world titles in 2003, 2012, 2013 and 2021, the last at 39, an 18-year span unmatched in a discipline that punishes ageing reflexes. His calm, tidy riding through technical sections, rather than outright risk, is the reason he lasted.
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Rachel Atherton
Born
Downhill. Atherton won multiple world titles and, in 2016, every World Cup round plus the world championship, a perfect season. Her strength and body position in steep, rough sections let her ride lines most of the field avoided, and she raised the technical standard of women's downhill.
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Danny Hart (cyclist)
Born
Downhill. Hart's 2011 world title run in the mud at Champéry, sliding through off-camber turns with the commentator shouting, is the most replayed run in downhill. He added a second world title in 2016, and both came on wet, slippery tracks where control matters more than raw speed.
More about Danny Hart (cyclist)10
Aaron Gwin
Born
Downhill. Gwin won five World Cup overall titles, and in 2015 at Leogang won a World Cup round after his chain snapped at the start, pumping the whole track without pedalling. That run is the clearest demonstration of how much downhill speed comes from technique rather than power.
More about Aaron Gwin11
Loïc Bruni
Born
Downhill. Bruni has won the elite world title at least five times and several World Cup overalls, often with the fastest final sector on tracks that get rougher as the day goes on. His ability to raise his pace in the final run, when others tighten up, is his signature.
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Valentina Höll
Born
Downhill. The Austrian dominated junior racing and then won elite world and World Cup titles in her early twenties, with a jump-focused, playful style unusual in women's downhill. She is the best current example of slopestyle-like air control applied to a race clock.
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Gunn-Rita Dahle Flesjå
Born
Cross-country and marathon. The Norwegian won Olympic cross-country gold in 2004 and world titles in both cross-country and marathon, and was still racing at World Cup level into her forties. Her descending on rocky courses gave her an edge over climbers who were her equal uphill.
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Julien Absalon
Born
Cross-country. Absalon won Olympic gold in 2004 and 2008 and a long run of world and World Cup titles, on courses that were becoming steeper and more technical. His smoothness on descents meant he rarely lost time where others took risks.
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Nino Schurter
Born
Cross-country. Schurter won Olympic gold in 2016, ten elite world titles and a record number of World Cup races. He was an early adopter of dropper posts and full suspension in cross-country, adapting his equipment as courses grew more technical.
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Jolanda Neff
Born
Cross-country. Neff won Olympic gold in Tokyo, leading a Swiss clean sweep, after recovering from a serious crash in 2019, and has world titles in cross-country and marathon. She is known for attacking on technical descents rather than only on climbs.
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Tom Pidcock
Born
Cross-country. Pidcock won Olympic gold in Tokyo and Paris and a second elite world title in 2026, and is famous for descending faster than anyone on the road too: his 2022 Tour de France win at Alpe d'Huez was set up on the descent of the Galibier. On technical cross-country descents he routinely takes back time lost on climbs.
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Pauline Ferrand-Prévot
Born
Cross-country. Ferrand-Prévot won Olympic cross-country gold in Paris 2024 and world titles in cross-country, marathon and other disciplines, before switching back to the road. Her bike handling across cyclo-cross, gravel and mountain biking makes her one of the most complete technical riders of her generation.
More about Pauline Ferrand-Prévot19
Brandon Semenuk
Born
Freeride and slopestyle. Semenuk won Red Bull Rampage a record five times between 2008 and 2024 and is one of the most successful slopestyle riders in history, in judged events where riders pick their own lines down cliffs or through jump courses. His smooth, unhurried style on huge features is the reference point for judged mountain biking.
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