UCI Mountaibike World Championships

UCI Mountainbike World Cup in Scotland

After Anne had to cancel the World Championships in advance due to health reasons, four riders represented the Factory Racing Team in Scotland.

The cross-country competitions took place in Glentress Forest, south of Edinburgh - much to the delight of Isla, who comes from this region and achieved magnificent results at her home World Championships - but more about that later.

Nicole started first on the road, as she did last year. As the reigning World Champion team, Nicole was able to defend the title in the Mixed Team Time Trial and won the rainbow jersey with her Swiss team, which includes FDJ rider Stefan Küng.

Caroline also won the bronze medal in the Cross-Country Team Relay with the Danish team (including Sebastian Fini Carstensen, Lapierre MAVIC Unity Team) in the run-up to the individual competitions.

E-MTB

The cross-country individual races started on Wednesday in the E-MTB category.

Jeroen's crash in Bergamo 3 weeks before the start of the World Championships was worse than initially expected and a concussion kept him from his preparation.

Although the training week before the World Championships was successful, Jeroen had to struggle again with the consequences of his fall after his arrival in Scotland and was only able to do three training runs.

Jeroen delivered a successful competition, finishing in 7th place.

Cross Country Short Track

Isla, who achieved a strong 27th place in the MTB Marathon a few days earlier, was the only rider from the GFR team to compete in the Cross Country Short Circuit on Thursday. In front of the home crowd, Isla outdid herself and, despite not having competed in a single Short Circuit race in the World Cup so far, achieved the best result of her career with 13th place.

XCO U23

The following Friday, Finja competed in the U23 Olympic cross-country competition. Unfortunately, our German junior rider was involved in a crash in the first lap and fell back to 40th place. Afterwards, however, she showed her great fighting spirit, fought her way forward lap after lap and reached the finish line as the second best German in an excellent 12th place.

Cross Country Olympic

Saturday marked the last day of the MTB competitions. After it had rained during the night, our riders did not find dry conditions for the first time. Even the continuous

Nicole, Caroline and Isla did very well and finished in 11th place (Nicole). With places 11 (Nicole), 18 (Caroline) and 25 (Isla), all three GHOST athletes achieved very good placements in the top 25.

Outlook

For our GHOST Factory Racing athletes, it's now back to the second half of the World Cup. The next races will take place from 25.8.-27.8.2023 in Andorra, where Anne was able to take victory the previous year.

Jeroen, on the other hand, is currently going full throttle with Tobi Müller at the E-Tour du Mont Blanc of the E-Bike World Tour. Afterwards, Jeroen will compete again in the E-MTB races from the beginning of September.