Rebecca's Story
Hailing from the ACT, Rebecca Henderson first started mountain biking when she was just 12-years-old. As a sporty kid she grew up participating in athletics, field hockey and cross-country running, but it was mountain bike riding that stole her heart and which later became her sole focus.
Leading into her debut Olympics at London 2012, Rebecca claimed first at the 2011 U23 Australian Championships and U23 Oceania Championships. She then went on to claim her first World Cup podium at the 2012 U23 UCI Mountain Bike World Cup in Belgium, finishing the event with the bronze medal.
At 20-years-old Rebecca made her Olympic debut and finished 25th overall behind world U23 champion Julie Bressert (France) in London.
The six-time national champion qualified for her first Commonwealth Games in 2014, where she walked away with the bronze medal in the women’s mountain bike final. Two years later, she achieved a career-best result when she won the bronze medal in the open division at the 2016 World Cup held in Cairns.
That same year, she claimed Australia’s only female mountain bike spot for the Rio 2016 Olympic Games. However, her second Olympic campaign was tough after falling too far behind the leaders due to a back injury, forcing her to withdraw from the competition in 25th position.
After marrying her long-time partner and Olympic teammate Daniel McConnell in 2017, the duo both competed in the 2018 Gold Coast Commonwealth Games.
Unfortunately, both were unable to back up their bronze medal performances from Glasgow 2014, with Rebecca finishing the event in sixth place, while Daniel finished in seventh.
The 29-year-old went on to claim the bronze medal in the cross-country event at both the 2019 World Championships in Mont Saint Anne and 2020 World Championships in Leogang.Making her third Olympic appearance at Tokyo 2020, after competing in London in 2012 and Rio in
2016, Rebecca finished 28th in the women’s cross-country final at Izu.
Rebecca was 14mins 43secs behind gold medallist Jolanda Neff, who led a clean sweep of the podium for Switzerland with Sina Frei and Linda Indergand claiming silver and bronze.
After a successful 2022 season in which she won three World Cup events, Rebecca started 2023 in the best possible way, winning her 10th Australian championship. It was her 19th national title across elite and junior categories.
“I love to represent Australia,” Rebecca said. “I’m very proud to be an Aussie and overseas I’m very much known as the Aussie girl and I like to keep it that way.”
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