Quietly Fast: At Home With Rémi Thirion
Eighteen years on the World Cup circuit. A lifetime in the Vosges mountains. Inside the career of Giant Factory Off-Road Team rider Rémi Thirion, one of downhill's most enduring racers.
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Rémi Thirion has been racing World Cup downhill for nearly two decades. That sentence alone should tell you something. In a sport that moves fast and is hard on everything—bikes, bodies, careers—that kind of longevity doesn't happen by accident.
Thirion is entering his 18th season on the circuit. He won his first World Cup in 2013, earned a bronze medal at the 2020 World Championships, stood on the podium twice in 2024, and was the fastest qualifier last year in Les Gets. He's not hanging on. He's still in the fight.
To many in the pits, Rémi is also known as “Mitch.” He's been Mitch since childhood—a nickname earned at his local mountain bike club, where a certain haircut drew comparisons to Baywatch's Mitch Buchannon.
An older clubmate already had the name Rémi, so the nickname stuck. Most things do with Thirion. Spend time with him at home in northeastern France and you start to understand why the career has lasted this long. The longevity isn't just fitness or talent. It's temperament—quiet, deliberate, committed.
NEVER LEFT THE BIKE
Thirion grew up in Raves, a small town in the Vosges mountains, near Saint-Dié. His father was a motocross rider, and naturally Rémi and his older brother wanted to follow the same path. Their father had other ideas.
“We wanted to ride motorbikes,” Thirion says. “My dad rode a lot, but he wasn’t really in favor of us starting with that. He wanted us to learn on bikes first. And actually, I never left the bike. It became my passion.”
His brother started competing first. Rémi watched, waited, and then followed. By 14 he was racing French Cup events and national level series. The results came quickly, faster than he expected, faster than he’d planned for.
“Everything kind of fell into place without me really planning it,” he says. “I never wanted to make it my job at first. I just wanted to reach the top level and see how far I could go.”
He went far. By his early twenties, Thirion had established himself as one of France’s most exciting downhill talents—fast, stylish, and known for creative line choices that other riders couldn’t see or wouldn’t dare attempt. His breakthrough came at the 2013 World Cup in Vallnord, Andorra, where he took his first elite victory. He was 23 years old. The career he never planned had arrived.
Remi on the podium early in his career.
Another podium Remi in his young racing career.
THE VISIONARY CAT
Benoit Vergnaud has been around Thirion for the better part of two decades. He knows him as well as anyone on the circuit. And when asked to describe what makes Mitch different from the dozens of fast riders who have come and gone in that time, Vergnaud reaches for another nickname.
“The visionary cat,” he says, grinning. “If you want to use nice adjectives, the visionary cat. He always finds incredible lines. He’s often the guy opening lines that seem almost impossible.”
It’s an apt description. In downhill racing, line selection is everything. Two riders can have identical fitness and bike setup, but the one who finds the faster, cleaner way down the track wins. It’s part instinct, part experience, and part courage—the willingness to commit to a line that hasn’t been proven. Thirion has built a career on that ability. It’s the reason he’s still a top competitor in a field increasingly dominated by athletes a decade younger.
Remi's mechanic and longtime friend, Benoit Vergnaud.
Thirion doesn’t shy away from the reality of competing against the next wave. “It inevitably gets harder with the new generation coming up,” he says. “They’ve been pushing me for a while now. But with experience, I can still stand out from time to time.”
Thirteen years have passed since that first win in Vallnord. Since then he’s achieved nine career podiums, a World Championship bronze, and a consistency that keeps him in the top tier of the sport year after year. But the second win remains the target.
“I’m clearly aiming to take a second win,” he says, plainly. No drama. No desperation. Just the same quiet conviction that has carried him this far.
Remi Thirion on the Podium.
Giant Factory Off-Road Team athlete Remi Thirion racing in Les Gets.
HOMETOWN ROOTS
Between World Cup rounds, Thirion comes back to the Vosges. He always has. The mountains, the dense forest trails, the people—everything that shaped him as a rider is still right outside his door.
“The Vosges mountains are an amazing playground,” he says. “So many trails, so many downhill tracks to train on. My friends are here, my family is from here, and my wife’s family as well. Even though I’ve traveled all over the world for years, I’m always happy to come back home.”
Home is where the story gets fuller. Thirion lives with his wife Charlotte and their children. Charlotte Orzes Thirion has known Rémi for 17 years, nearly as long as his racing career. She describes him in terms that would surprise anyone who has only seen the visor and the race face.
“Rémi is a real family dad,” Charlotte says. “He loves spending time with his kids, being silly, clowning around. We go on lots of family bike rides, we go skiing.”
Fatherhood has changed how Thirion approaches the bike. Not slower, smarter. The daredevil who chased risky lines at any cost has given way to a rider who understands what’s worth risking and what isn’t.
“I guess with age you calm down a bit. You ride smarter,” Thirion says. “Before, I was a bit of a daredevil, always trying risky lines. Now, with crashes, injuries, getting older, and being a father, I ride differently—in a better way.”
That evolution hasn’t slowed him down. If anything, it’s done the opposite. Vergnaud has watched it happen in real time.
“The older he gets, the better it seems to work, honestly,” Vergnaud says. “The consistency is there. He’s grown as a person, and today he’s here with all that experience, all that feeling. Yeah, he’s just got class.”
Follow Rémi Thirion and the Giant Factory Off-Road Team throughout the World Cup season.