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Missy Giove caught with 400lb of marijuana

Missy Giove, the retired queen of downhill, has always been credited with broadening our sport’s audience and getting downhill into the mainstream media. And she’s still doing it, but this time it’s in a way that none of us will be proud to be associated with.

What happened? Apparently, Missy Giove (who has no prior criminal record) was arrested for her role in transporting a huge amount of marijuana to an associate’s house. There, police also uncovered large sums of money indicating the weed was for more than just medicinal purposes – sure, Missy probably has a helluva lot of old injuries to treat, but not that many, right? You can read the full Associated Press version of it here.

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Missy Giove.
Photo: Silvia Otte, www.silviaotte.com

The media fallout from this is going to be huge. It’s already on ESPN, in most major newspapers across the US, and all the MTB websites will be covering it. Dirtmag.co.uk calls it a ’sad day for the downhill community’. If you’re a member of an MTB forum online, brace yourself for the slagging off that the Joe-nobodies all over the world are going to be dishing out now that one of the sport’s greatest heroes has fallen from grace.

Missy did awesome things for the sport of downhill mountain biking, and particularly for women within it, which is why she’s a ‘Hucker Heroine’. As an indication of how big the current interest in her is, that page normally gets around 10 hits a day. In the last 12hrs it’s had over 7,000 and is still spiking straight up.

Can anything good come of out such a stupid and disappointing turn of events? Well, for Missy personally I doubt criminal convictions will be fun, but maybe she didn’t do what we’re told she did, it’s only at the accusation stage now although it sounds pretty clear. But for us as a sporting community, we’re probably going to have to spend a bit of extra effort proving we’re not stoner drug dealers to people who are lazy with their preconceptions of groups and tar all mountain bikers with the same brush. But so what? It’s nothing compared to the drug stigma already attached to road cycling.

As women mountain bikers we’ve lost faith in a colorful and inspirational figure in our community, but maybe it’s liberating as well. Missy’s commercial success and rockstar image were unparalleled and something many riders have attempted to duplicate with only limited success. Now that she’s been caught with a carload of pot and will be soon known as widely for this drug bust for her riding, we’ll have to find another hero, and find our own way to fame and notoriety instead of looking back at how she did it. This latest act is definitely the wrong way for female downhillers to get on ESPN.