Fionn Griffiths (born 27 August 1982, Shrewsbury, Shropshire) is a female British downhill mountain bike rider.[1] She has won 19 Downhill (DH) and 4X world cups and stood on 57 World Cup podiums over the 18 years of her career. Griffiths founded and ran GR Management, a sports marketing agency in 2001 specialising in sports marketing - team, athlete and event management. Over her career she has owned and run multiple World Cup teams: The NORCO World Team, GR Orange, GR INTENSE, GR Evil, bringing overall team podium finishes in the UCI (Union Cycliste Internationale) Elite Team standings as well as representing many athletes in a management capacity. Over the years her athletes and teams have won multiple world championships and World Cup events across a range of sports.
| Personal information | |
|---|---|
| National team | British |
| Born | 27 August 1982 Shrewsbury, Shropshire |
| Sport | |
| Sport | Downhill & 4X Mountain Biking + Motorcycle Racing |
| Event(s) | Downhill, 4X Mountain Biking + Enduro (motorcycles) |
| Achievements and titles | |
| Personal best(s) | Two times Downhill World Cup Champion;
4X World Cup Winner; 57x UCI World Cup Podiums; European Enduro Champion; Two time World Championship silver medalist; Five times UK National DH Champion |
Griffiths is a two time world cup champion. She holds 2 bronze and 3 silverworld championship medals as well as being a five time UK national champion in her discipline of DH. She also competed on the GB team for off-road motorcycle racing for a number of years and holds European Enduro champion title in this discipline [2][3]
In 2015 Griffiths ended her race career prematurely when she landed a jump awkwardly (Fort William World Cup) resulting in a compression fracture of her lower spine for which later required a fusion surgery.
Following injury she moved to Asolo in Italy where she worked with her long time sponsor Alpinestars to design and develop their technician MX and Mountain Bike product lines.
She moved back to the UK in 2017 where she took a position with Husqvarna Motorcycles as the National Marketing and Events coordinator.
She is currently a firefighter in the West Midlands area.[4]
History edit
Griffiths first got into mountain biking when she had a car accident and used it to help her recovery from injuries sustained from the crash. She then continued to bike and at a local training day collected information from Mid Shropshire Wheelers club.[2]
[3]
Over her career she set up and ran a number of world cup UCI teams starting with The NORCO World Team, Intense and then KTM.[3]
Injuries edit
In 2004 Griffiths broke her ankle at the start of the season. In an interview with BBC Wales she talked about the incident: "It was one of the biggest mistakes I've ever made. I'm only now beginning to realize how to mentally put myself back together."[2] She ended up breaking her ankle 7 times in a year and a half after trying to continue her race season despite her injuries.[2] over her career she also sustained other multiple major injuries including, concussions, broken wrists, hip injury, fractured neck, fractured thoracic spine, multiple dislocated shoulders, ribs and fingers and Internal bleeding.
References edit
- ^ "Fionn Griffiths". Cycling Archives. Retrieved 19 March 2021.
- ^ a b c d "Fionn Griffiths". BBC Wales. 2012. Retrieved 19 March 2021.
- ^ a b c Greenwood, Susan. "Five minutes with top downhiller Fionn Griffiths: Taking control of her own racing career". Total Women's cycling. Retrieved 19 March 2021.
- ^ British MTB (29 August 2019). "Fionn Griffiths". Facebook. Retrieved 19 March 2021.