Paris (AFP)

Looking at the pictures is enough to make you shudder, but Myriam Nicole, ignoring the roots, trees and rickety rocks, descends the slope towards the title of world downhill champion: at 31 years old, the mountain biker is at the top of a specialty as spectacular as it is technical.

A last moment of calm, then up to its watchword: "the attack", she told AFP.

On August 29, on the descent of Val di Sole, in northern Italy, one of the most difficult in the world, Myriam Nicole scrolls the two kilometers of slope and tames the elements at a disconcerting speed, under the encouragement from an audience that knows her to be a favorite.

In four minutes, Montpellier found itself world champion for the second time in her career, to the cheers of her competitors.

"I arrived in a leading position because I had won a World Cup round just before (in Maribor on August 15, Editor's note). There was more pressure but it is a track that I like and I managed to hold on to the bottom, ”says Nicole.

-World cup goal-

"Pompom" as she's nicknamed has never seemed so comfortable.

Rainbow jersey on the back, it won a week later during the penultimate stage of the World Cup, in Switzerland, and was at the top of the general classification before the last stage in the United States. which ends on Saturday.

The double "is the goal" for the ambitious mountain biker with a singing accent.

The French Myriam Nicole in the final descent of the World Cup stage in Leogang in Austria on June 11, 2021 JFK APA / AFP / Archives

The last and only daughter of a family of four children, Myriam fell into mountain biking when she was little, in her native South: "I have brothers who have done competitions. I wanted to follow them, go to mountain bike school. with them. And it is a sport well developed in the South ".

The little sister quickly made a name for herself in a discipline little practiced by girls.

“I knew the podiums very early on.”

Six-time champion of France, European champion in 2010, World Cup in 2017 and finally world champion (2019 and 2021), Myriam Nicole currently dominates a specialty where the French have not been outdone for a few years.

Behind her, the young Marine Cabirou was crowned vice-world champion in Val di Sole, Loris Vergier is European champion, and Thibaut Daprela stage winner this season.

- "Fear makes me master" -

From the descent, she appreciates the “fun side”.

However, nothing is left to chance.

Each piece of land is analyzed, first on foot, then by bicycle, with the camera planted on the helmet to detect obstacles in preparation.

"I know exactly between which pebble and which root I'm going to put my wheels. We even know when there are stones which start to move, those which are likely to come loose, we apprehend the turns. We understand how the terrain evolves and how we can anticipate that ".

World downhill mountain bike champion Myriam Nicole during a photo shoot in Paris on September 9, 2021 JOEL SAGET AFP / Archives

And on D-day, the eternal fear, necessary, "makes me master the elements around me".

"There are tools that are to focus on yourself and play with the limits, but in a good way."

Anticipations that do not prevent injuries.

The graduate in physiotherapy studies no longer counts them: "there were the collarbones, the hand ..." And more recently, in 2018, a serious foot injury which kept her away from the bike for several months, a week before the start of the season.

"I took a gust of wind which put me down, I put all the weight of my body on the foot and it broke everything."

But returned to the underdog the following season, she won her first world title in 2019. She did it again this summer.

Before the double on Saturday?

© 2021 AFP