This year, the World Championships also marked the end of the season. After an already long and intensive season, the aim was to get back into top form and successfully utilise all the experience gained. Strengthened by an altitude training camp in St. Moritz, the Swiss team travelled to Bulgaria in high spirits. A large part of the team already has some experience of Bulgarian terrain from the 2022 World Cup.
We prepared ourselves on site by joining a training camp run by the Bulgarian national team for a few days and completing shorter training sessions on various maps. I quickly got a good feel for the interpretation of the maps, but I also knew that the terrain in Shumen would be different to the one here.
Sprint
After the modelling event, the first competition was already on the agenda. After the 2022 World Cup final, I didn’t have high expectations for a sprint in a Bulgarian village. Back then, the sprint was very easy and not worthy of the World Cup in my eyes. However, the organisers of the World Cup clearly exceeded my expectations and delivered an exciting sprint with challenging route choices. Unfortunately, the village was not free of traffic, contrary to what had been announced, and I experienced some dangerous situations. This also meant that I slowed down considerably at junctions to avoid the risk of an accident. This was certainly not conducive to a good result in the sprint, but as my focus was on the forest disciplines in the coming days, I didn’t want to take any risks. My run went relatively well and I got through without any major uncertainties. I’m happy with my 16th place and am looking forward to the coming days. GPS | results | splits
Massstart
The next day was the mass start. I didn’t get off to a good start in this usually hectic race. I got a bit trapped at the start and lost touch with the front runners on the narrow path that followed, as overtaking manoeuvres were practically impossible. I thought it was a bit of a shame that only simple loops were used as forks. It quickly became clear which options were available and you could also immediately see on the map which options the other athletes had. This took some of the tension out of the race. I had good legs and was able to keep up well. However, on the second loop of the first butterfly, I read to the wrong control, took a wrong turn and lost touch with the group I was travelling with. After that, I was mostly on my own. This wasn’t a bad thing for me, on the contrary. Thanks to the lack of direct contact with my opponents, I was able to concentrate better and navigate cleanly through the much more challenging second part of the race. This allowed me to make up a few places and I ended up in 16th place again. I’m a little disappointed with the result, because I know that with a better start and without the one unnecessary mistake, much more would have been possible. GPS | results | splits
Middle
The third competition of these World Championships was the middle distance. It had the same goal as the mass start the day before. I also strongly suspected that the area of the final part of the mass start would be used again. In this final section, I was able to gain some confidence. Just one day later, however, the conditions were completely different: instead of greasy mud, the ground was hard and dry again, allowing for fast riding. The sun was shining, which made it more difficult to see junctions in the strong light/dark contrasts in the deciduous forest. I had a good start at the beginning and was able to navigate safely through the area with many paths. I was then able to push well on the easier sections. However, small uncertainties soon crept in. I briefly missed a turn-off here and didn’t know exactly which route I really needed to take. Unfortunately, I made these mistakes too often, but I was able to avoid any big mistakes. The Finn Miika Nurmi, who started two minutes after me, caught up with me towards the end of the race. We contested the last controls together. It was quite fast, he had a good pace. In the end, I finished in 23rd place, which was a rather disappointing result for me. GPS | results | splits
Long
After a well-earned rest day, my favourite distance was on the agenda. I had to conquer almost 1000 metres in altitude. The organisers offered an exciting competition. They deviated from my expectations right at the start: Instead of heading straight up the hill, we first looped round in the flatter area at the foot of the hill. Unfortunately, the map there was very inaccurate. In one place, four power lines running parallel to each other were missing. In other places, lines were marked. Mistakes like this really shouldn’t happen at a World Cup. At exactly this place I (and according to the GPS not only me, but not too many) was very unsettled. It was down a fast but uneven path that can be travelled at high speed. As a result, I lost control of the distance I had already travelled. At the prominent lines, which I couldn’t find anywhere on the map, I assumed I had already ridden off the map. I was then able to catch myself after discovering that at least the clear-cut under the lines was mapped. After that, the map section was very inaccurate, the map too often didn’t match the terrain. After this time-consuming mistake, Luca Dallavalle, who had started three minutes after me, had almost caught up with me. However, at the first map change, where I received a new map for the first time in my career in the terrain, I was able to distance myself from him again. I then managed most of the route choices and was able to navigate safely to the finish. Physically, I still felt very good in the fourth race of this World Championship. Unfortunately, I still only managed 15th place, but the fact that even without this mistake I would only have finished 12th showed that I should probably have skied much faster and taken a little more risk on some routes. I showed a stable performance and deliberately didn’t take too many risks. So overall I’m not dissatisfied with my race. GPS | results | splits
Relay
The relay was the fitting conclusion to these World Championships, and for me also the end of the season. But I’m also very happy to be there at all, because there are four of us in the Swiss team who do Bike-O at a pretty similar level. So one was too many. Our coach Christine Schaffner already made the selections on the rest day. I was allowed to take part in the relay on the final stretch. Flurin and Noah tried to get a good starting position ahead of me. Flurin showed a fast race and came back in eighth place. Noah also performed well and only made one small mistake. He handed over to me in seventh position. I started the race together with Vojtech Stransky from the second Czech team. We were able to take turns on the physical sections and set a good pace. We had different forks, but as they were all close together, we only lost each other later when Vojtech became unsure and I pulled through. However, he caught up again with a better route and a slightly shorter fork. Shortly afterwards, I was able to pull through more or less by heart on a route that was similar to the one from the long distance and which we had looked at closely, while Vojtech hesitated. I was able to create a gap there, which I was able to maintain right to the finish. I was delighted with what I thought was fifth place, also because I knew that there was nothing more in it today. Unfortunately, a very dejected Flurin soon came up to me and told me that he had missed the mark. At control 7, he didn’t pass close enough to the control, his SIAC didn’t register the control and our entire team was disqualified as a result. Quite a damper for us, even if we hadn’t won a medal. However, our women’s team did. After a short time, our disappointment faded into the background and we were able to celebrate their bronze medal with the women’s team. Congratulations! GPS | resultats | splits
