It was fourth time lucky for French cross-country mountain biker Pauline Ferrand-Prévot on Sunday, who won gold after coming back from three other Olympics empty-handed. Hers is the second gold medal for France of Paris 2024.
Ferrand-Prévot completed the course at Elancourt Hill outside Paris in 1:26:02, ahead of Haley Batten of the United States in second and Sweden's Jenny Rissveds in third.
The five-time world champion dominated from the start, finishing the seven laps of the route over a former quarry nearly three minutes ahead of her closest competitor.
Ferrand-Prévot has a clutch of titles in events from road cycling to cyclo-cross, but hadn't yet secured an Olympic medal.
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She finished 25th in the cross-country mountain biking at London 2012, as well as eighth in the road race. At Rio four years later she was forced to abandon the cross-country mid-race due to a pre-existing injury, and at the Tokyo Games she managed 10th.
"I told myself if you're going to win, you may as well win at home," she told reporters on Friday.
"Apart from the Olympics, I've more or less won everything. It's really the title I'm missing."
As Ferrand-Prévot celebrated finally adding it to her collection, the home crowd sang national anthem La Marseillaise.
"She mastered it like a queen, I take my hat off to her," Julie Bresset, the last woman to win an Olympic gold for France in the event in 2012, told RFI.
"She was there in London when I became Olympic champion and I'm happy to have been in the audience today."
Ferrand-Prévot announced after the race that she plans to retire from mountain biking at the end of the year, switching her focus to road cycling – and an attempt at the women's Tour de France in 2025.
