The World Championships 2023 will take place in August in Jicin in the Czech Republic. In order to prepare ourselves optimally, the entire Swiss team travelled to Doksy, where the famous MTBO 5-Days took place. It offered 5 competitions covering all the individual disciplines of the World Championships. Unfortunately, due to my exams, I could not compete in the first two competitions (middle & sprint). I followed my team mates some days later by night train. Due to a small delay, I arrived at the competition centre about 10 minutes before the mass start. I started the race without a real warm-up. At the beginning I had a bit of trouble keeping up, especially physically. But after that I got better and better into the race, was able to close gaps with some route choices and was at times right at the front. In the end, it was enough for 7th place, which I am quite satisfied with. I have not done any major mistakes and could keep a good flow throughout the race.
My second race was the long distance. I started pretty much at the end, which meant that with almost 100 riders in the men elite category, I could recover from the mass start until 14:27. In the meantime, the heat didn’t get any less, but I still managed to show a good race. I only had one small lack of concentration, which cost me about 40 seconds, but otherwise I chose mostly good routes and also felt physically fresh. Eventually I finished second, with which I’m more than happy! Since the winner also came from the Swiss team and was called Simon Hellmüller, we could even celebrate a double victory for Switzerland!
The end of the 5-Days is traditionally a chase start with a semi-free-order system. In this mode, the order of some controls is predetermined, while other controls have to be completed in any order. Iplanned these free controls rather suboptimally, and I didn’t have the freshest legs any more. Since I was unable to compete in the first 2 stages, I was no longer in the running for the overall victory anyway, and therefore took the race a bit easier than the last two.
The rest of the team planned a rest day on Monday, but for me it was to make up for the missed two stages. I did so, and although my legs were pretty empty, I was able to complete the two races again relatively quickly and benefit from the cool terrain and courses.
After the competitions in Doksy, the Swiss team moved on to train in areas which were somewhat closer to the competition areas of the World Championships. While the terrain in Doksy was rather flat, the World Championships will be characterised by many and steep climbs. The sandy terrain of Doksy will be exchanged for clayey terrain in Jicin. During the training sessions in terrain that is supposed to be similar to the World Championships, I felt comfortable from the beginning and found my way around the maps well, even though some of them were a bit older. Personally, I am looking forward to the hilly terrain, because I like steep climbs very much. I am especially looking forward to the long distance with over 1000 metres of altitude. Now, in the remaining five weeks to the world champs, I have to recover from the intensive training sessions and then put the finishing touches on my training so that I can start the World Championships in good shape and refreshed. A preview with links to all the possibilities to follow us live will follow immediately before the World Championships.