Downhill MTB in 2025: a sport on the brink, and the responsibility of Warner Bros. Discovery to save it
Riders earn less than minimum wage, team owners cut their own salaries, and the only way forward is collective responsibility, bold vision—and a lot less noise.
The 2025 season has shown the world what elite downhill mountain biking is capable of. New qualifying formats have made race weekends more thrilling and unpredictable. Athletes are more skilled than ever. The energy on track is explosive. But off the track, behind the scenes, the financial foundations of this sport are cracking.
Thanks to the Pinkbike State of the Sport survey, we now have hard data: the majority of top-level DH riders are earning less than $30,000 per year, with 22% of them making less than $5,000, and 6% earning nothing at all. Team owners like Bernard Kerr have gone on record saying they’ve cut their own salaries for 2025—just to keep the ball rolling in hopes of better days ahead.
This isn’t just a rider problem. It’s a sport-wide emergency.
And the only entity with enough media power and global reach to change the direction of this sport is Warner Bros. Discovery (WBD). With the honor of owning the rights to the UCI MTB World Series comes the responsibility—the burden and the privilege—to help reshape its entire economic model.
Let’s talk numbers: the financial cliff edge
22% of downhill riders make less than $5,000/year.
55% earn under $30,000—not even a modest full-time salary in most countries.
Prize money? A DH rider who wins everything all year long—including the World Championship—would earn just €52,500.
Compare that to road cycling:
Tour de France winner: €500,000
UCI Women’s WorldTeam minimum salary: €27,500
Men’s ProTeam minimum: €32,100
Even the lower-tier riders in road cycling often earn more than the top 10% of DH racers.
And it’s not just about athletes. Teams are on the verge of collapse. The expanded calendar (now 10 races), increasing travel and registration costs, and shrinking sponsor budgets have created a recipe for financial burnout. And when team owners—who should be managing, investing, and planning—start sacrificing their own salaries, you know the model is broken.
The new format is a step forward—but the business model is still stuck
Let me say it clearly: the new qualifying format with no protected riders and a Q1 + Q2 structure is a brilliant move. It brings suspense, disrupts predictability, and reminds me of the LCQ system in Supercross, where anything can happen in the final push for a spot in the show. This is how you build narrative, tension, and viewership.
But here’s the catch: you can’t build audience while hiding your best content.
Putting everything live behind a paywall, and delaying highlights by hours? That’s a mistake. We are trying to grow the sport. Now is the time to let it all out—free, immediate, and viral. Monetizing through pay TV at this stage is like selling tickets to an empty stadium. The real value lies in audience building, not gated content.
Media saturation: more isn’t better
Another elephant in the room? The media arms race. Every team now travels with its own mini media squad, creating micro-content that floods Instagram and TikTok—but let’s be honest: most of it is noise, not storytelling.
There’s no coordination, no consistency, no shared strategy. This leads to:
Redundant expenses (media staff are expensive),
Overlapping content, and
Diminishing returns in audience engagement.
The solution? WBD should lead a coordinated media strategy across all teams. Centralize production, share raw footage, align messaging. Instead of 20 teams posting 20 variations of the same corner clip, create shared narratives, deep profiles, emotional arcs, and hero stories that live across platforms and continents.
This isn’t just cost-saving—it’s storytelling at scale.
What WBD must do to fulfill its responsibility
WBD says it wants to grow the sport. But that means investing, not just filming. Here’s what needs to happen:
1. Open up access, kill the paywall
To bring in outside sponsors and new fans, we need eyes on the sport—now.
Stream events free and globally accessible.
Offer instant highlights and recaps.
Build YouTube, Instagram, and TikTok with real-time content.
Visibility is worth more than a few subscription fees.
2. Introduce minimum rider compensation
Take a page from road cycling:
Set minimum base salaries for riders competing in World Cups.
Create appearance fees or travel stipends.
Ensure top 30 athletes can live from the sport they dedicate their lives to.
Because right now, being a “pro” means needing a side job or parents who can bankroll your dream.
3. Support team sustainability
Teams are drowning in costs. WBD can:
Subsidize travel and logistics, especially for non-factory teams.
Share media revenues with teams who contribute athletes and access.
Offer centralized services (mechanical bays, video crews, housing blocks) to reduce overhead.
Healthy teams are the foundation of a healthy series.
4. Unify and streamline media production
As mentioned, content isn’t the issue—coordination is.
Align all teams under a shared media umbrella.
Use the same footage and messaging across channels.
Elevate storytelling, not just stats and clips.
Let’s replace the noise with signal—and give the fans something worth following.
5. Make riders marketable beyond results
Not every rider will podium. But every rider has a story. WBD should:
Help athletes build personal brands.
Offer content creation support for behind-the-scenes and lifestyle content.
Treat riders as ambassadors, not just competitors.
In 2025, the line between athlete and influencer is fading fast—and that’s an opportunity, not a threat.
Build the sport, or watch it erode
Downhill mountain biking is at a crossroads.
The racing has never been better.
The riders are elite.
The show is thrilling.
But behind the scenes, the sport is fraying at the edges.
Warner Bros. Discovery has a chance to be remembered not just as the media company that filmed mountain biking—but as the one that saved it.
Because if they don’t act—if they prioritize short-term monetization over long-term vision—the sport may soon become a playground for a handful of elites, while the rest disappear into obscurity.
It’s time to do the right thing.
Less paywall. More access. Less noise. More story. Less burnout. More future.