2021 Pinkbike Awards: Comeback of the Year Nominees
After 2020's race season was decimated by the spread of the Coronavirus, the real Comeback of the Year should surely be racing itself. However, as 'racing' doesn't have a postal address, we'll have to award the gong to a racer instead. Comebacks generally involve injuries but don't forget the equally taxing mental fortitude it takes to overcome an injury and fight to be as fast as your peers once again. We aren’t writing this article to glorify injury but do believe that the strength of character shown by the athletes below deserves plenty of credit. Here are our nominees for Comeback of the Year.
Comback of the Year Nominees
Why he's nominated
Less than a week before the Les Gets World Cup, Thibaut Daprela was being airlifted to hospital with his tongue split in two and his face battered following a crash at a French Cup race. With his tongue requiring stitches, Daprela spent the week subsisting on chicken and rice milkshakes and then exacerbated the whole situation by crashing again on the first day of practice.
It's undeniable that rain played a role in his victory but he still laid down a heater time despite the stitches coming loose in his tongue during the run. Some number crunching will show that, rain or not, Daprela was probably on for a time that would have challenged for the top spot.
Why she's nominated
This is Jolanda's second consecutive nomination for the Comeback of the Year Award, simply because her return to the top has been stretched over two years of racing. Neff did well to be even riding her bike at World Cups last year following her near-death experience in the Pisgah woods but what she achieved this year eclipsed even that.
She started the year slowly, first struggling with a high pollen count in Albstadt then having to work her way through the field at the subsequent round in Nove Mesto. However, Neff had a bigger goal in mind. She spent the off-season focussing on technical riding and it paid off where it mattered most, at the Olympic Games. Building up the Olympics, Neff picked up a podium in both the XCC and XCO at the Leogang World Cup but a crash not captured on camera left her with a broken hand. She didn't let this dampen her dreams though and recovered quickly in time for the Olympics. When it came down to it, Neff was unstoppable on the Japanese course and led home a Swiss 1-2-3 sweep of the medals.
Why she's nominated
With the expectations piled on Vali Holl when she first came into the elite ranks it would have been impossible for her to match them. Winning every race? "Well, of course, that's Vali Holl." In reality, her adjustment took a bit longer than people might have expected. An injury at the World Champs scuppered her 2020 season and then she came in 2021 with expectations high once again.
While Holl was fully fit, she seemed to be struggling mentally with the pressures of racing. On more than one occasion, final corner crashes cost her strong results and she was struggling to find even the podium in the middle of the season. However, there was no doubt that she was blisteringly fast. Qualifying domination kept her in the title race and then in Snowshoe she was able to put her demons to rest, recording back-to-back World Cup wins and snatching the title out from Myriam Nicole's grasp.
Why he's nominated
When Tyler McCaul moved to Southern Utah to help prepare himself for Rampage, he couldn't imagine what a purgatory it would turn out to be. After he earned his best-ever result of fifth at the 2019 event, he spent the next 16 months on the couch rehabbing a brutal ankle injury.
Slowly but surely he began to work his way back to fitness with an eMTB to help him ride without his usual leg power until he returned to Rampage once more. Despite being off the bike for nearly a year, McCaul equalled his best-ever result from 2019 with a run that included big flips and high consequence suicide no-handers.
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Looking forward to seeing the most-competitive women's field ever in 2022.
Got cleared from cancer in february, raced in april, raced the full EWS tour, crankworx and a UCI DH World Cup in Leogang, also finished Enduro National Champion in Mexico!
That's a comeback.