Pauline Ferrand-Prevot wins mountain bike gold at Paris Olympics - ESPN

ELANCOURT, France — French mountain biker Pauline Ferrand-Prevot carries a pair of tattoos — the Olympic rings under her left wrist and the phrase «Life is a joke» on the back of her neck — that seemed altogether appropriate on Sunday.

After more than a decade of trying, she finally won the Olympic gold medal that had always eluded her. The rings on Ferrand-Prevot's wrist flashed to an adoring, sun-splashed crowd that refused to stop serenading her at the finish line. That phrase on her neck? Well, the joke was on everybody else in the mountain bike race.

She pulled away early and they never saw her again, finishing 2 minutes, 57 seconds ahead of everyone else.

Might as well have been an eternity.

«I was just thinking about myself and not the others, and just riding my own race,» Ferrand-Prevot said. «I was like a robot. I didn't hear anyone on the course. Even my parents, I didn't really hear them. I was just on a mission.»

Haley Batten overtook Rio gold medalist Jenny Rissveds on the final lap to give the U.S. its best finish in an Olympic mountain bike race. Rissveds earned an emotional bronze after spending two years away from the sport working on her mental health.

«I visualized finishing with the medal around my neck for a long time,» Batten said, «so I knew I'd feel something special, but I can't explain how amazing that is.»

Loana Lecomte, the other French favorite, was third midway through the race when she hit a stretch known as a rock garden. She went over the handlebars and landed amid the boulders in a brutal crash that ended her Olympic dream. She was checked by medics but later attended Ferrand-Prevot's news conference with a bandage on her chin.

There also was heartbreak for Puck Pieterse of the