N1NO Schurter in 7th Heaven

A day to remember- N1NO Schurter today not only defended his Rainbow Jersey, but he secured the 7th World Championship title of his career in front of his home crowd in Lenzerheide, Switzerland.

Lenzerheide, Switzerland. N1NO Schurter today added the 7th World Champion Title to his list of victories and the 4th in a row. In front of 24.000 spectators- and at the biggest XC race in history- N1NO dominated the race from the beginning. Italian Gerhard Kerschbaumer was the only one who managed to keep the fight alive- until the end of the 6th lap, when N1NO decided to brake away and set the final attack.

Racing on his home turf, N1NO pushed himself to the next level: “It was hard, and harder than it maybe looked like. I didn’t have the best legs today. However, my fans made me forget about all the pain- it was truly epic.”
Photography: Sven Martin, Boris Beyer, Armin M. Küstenbrück/ego-promotion.

Before N1NO set the attack to get away, he and his Italian rival kept a bigger chasing group including Henrique Avancini (BRA), Florian Vogel (SUI), Mathieu van der Poel (NEL) and Matthias Flückiger (SUI) at a solid distance for several laps. “I knew that Kerschbaumer would be the strongest competitor today as he had a super strong season”, N1NO stated. After an attack from van der Poel, things were getting even more exciting as the Dutch Champion pushed an unbelievable hard pace from the middle of the race. It became obvious that this World Champion race would be decided between the three main rivals of the 2018 World Cup season- N1NO, Kerschbaumer, and van der Poel.

But N1NO not only knew every single root of this track. He also was patient and smart enough to keep calm and wait for the best moment to launch the final attack. With a 11sec lead, N1NO crossed the finish line ahead of Kerschbaumer and van der Poel (+1:14). The arena of Lenzerheide was upside-down, thousands of fans gathered at the finish and cheered to their local hero, the old- and new – World Champion.

“Together with the Olympic Gold medal, which I could win in 2016 in Rio, this probably is my sweetest victory. It felt like racing in standing ovations. Finally watching all the spectators at the ceremony going crazy is something which I would have not imagined, not in my wildest dreams. The great atmosphere in Lenzerheide is not only because of me and my success, it also a statement for mountain biking in Switzerland”, N1NO said.

No matter how huge the pressure, N1NO delivers in style.

Lenzerheide, Switzerland, September 8th, 2018, a day to remember- N1NO Schurter again is World Championship. Gerhard Kerschbaumer (ITA) left, 2nd), Mathieu van der Poel (NEL right, 3rd)

As of today, N1NO Schurter calls three Olympic medals (a bronze, a silver and a golden one) his own, he is a 7x World Champion, and a 6 time World Cup Champion. In addition, he has 30 World Cup wins to his name- three WC wins still missing to equalize Julien Absalon’s record of 33 wins.

N1NO Schurter’s Spark RC 900 Special Edition for Lenzerhheide

Nino Schurter rides one of the lightest, stiffest and fastest bikes available on the market, the Spark RC 900 World Cup. This 9.86 kg (incl. pedlas) race-dedicated full-suspension weapon is bred to win. For the UCI Worlds at Lenzerheide, SCOTT and Sram’s designers worked together on a Swiss Army Knife style race design with tons of nice details. Learn more about all Specs and details here.

1779gr for the frame (incl. shock & hardware), 9.86kg for the full package (incl pedals)- N1NO’s rig is a benchmark in many ways.

The frame

The benchmark weight of 1779g (incl. shock and hardware) of the team’s Spark RC 900 was not only achieved by utilizing the lightest and most exclusive HMX carbon fibers but also thanks to our sophisticated carbon lay-up process. The frame is made of 752 single carbon layers, all put together by hand. The heart of the frame is the Trunnion mount: the shock body extends between the two lower mounting bolts which results in more stroke for the same eye to eye length. The shorter shock enables a very compact frame and shock package, which integrates tightly to the seat tube.
Learn more about all Specs and details here.

A 2-sided frame design is applied on N1NO’s Spark RC. His cockpit is all about integration and optimiziation. The front with its Syncros Fraser iC SL stem-handle bar combo not only is a true eye-catcher, even more with its red and white design; it also saves a precious 49 grams. SCOTT’s proprietary TwinLoc enables N1NO to lock both Shock and fork for better climbing. A smoothly integrated Syncros mount for his Garmin device tops off the overall look.

Please find the Specs of N1NO’s Special Edition here:

First Elite World Championships for Andri Frischknecht

Andri Frischknecht finished in an excellent 13th place ahead of Maxime Marotte (FRA) “If you don’t enter the Top Ten in the first descent on this course, you’re in trouble. Manuel Fumic (GER) crashed just in front of me in the very first descent so everyone was forced to walk down the first downhill”, Andri said. “I was fighting my way back to the race step-by-step. It was unreal racing in front of this crowd- it was actually hard to stay focused because the fans were cheering so loud and so enthusiastic.”