Schurter triumphs in men's cross country at Vallnord World Cup

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World Cup leader Nino Schurter (Scott Swisspower) made a last lap surge to win his third straight UCI Cross Country Mountain Bike World Cup of the season at round 4 in Vallnord, Andorra. Altitude, heat and strong winds all played a factor in making this one of the hardest races of the season.

The men's six-lap race started out explosively fast, with a group of 10 riders forming at the front. The pace was being driven by Ondrej Cink (Multivan Merida), the under 23 world champion, who is now in his first year racing at the elite level. Schurter was one of the big names that missed the move, and had to claw his way back up after flatting on the first lap. Another absentee was Julien Absalon (BMC), who dropped his chain in the opening 300 metres of the race, falling to last place, and making an impressive effort over the remainder of the race to finally finish eighth; truly a magnificent performance.

At the front, Cink wasn't happy with the pace of the front group, and rode away solo on the second lap.

"On the second lap everyone was going slowly," said Cink, "and no one wanted to take the lead, so I went my own pace and by the top of the climb I had a good gap."

Schurter had finally joined the chase group by the end of the second lap, but Cink was now 20 seconds up on Maxime Marotte (BH-SR Suntour-KMC) and Gerhard Kerschbaumer (TX Active Bianchi), with the Schurter-led group a further 14 seconds in arrears.

By lap four, the Schurter group was six - Marotte, Kerschbaumer, Stephane Tempier (BH-SR Suntour-KMC), Fabian Giger (Giant Pro XC), Florian Vogel (Scott Swisspower) and Schurter himself. However, Cink had increased his lead to 40 seconds, and time was running out.

In the next lap, the Czech rider began to tire, and Schurter started to up his tempo, pulling to within 29 seconds as they started the final lap. The world champion then turned in the only sub-14 minute lap of the day on the final lap to finally reel in his young rival in the final kilometre. Cink tried an attack, but Schurter covered it, and then broke clear to win by six seconds, with Tempier also close to catching Cink at the line but having to settle for third.

"This is more than I could have hoped for," said Cink. "I would have been happy with a top-10. By the last lap I was beginning to believe I could win it, but then Nino came up to me. I attacked, but he came back, and got by me in the final singletrack. This result means more to me than winning the [under 23] world championships last year."

"It was a crazy race," said Schurter. "I had a bit of bad luck in the first loop, I flatted in the first descent. I needed quite a lot of power to close that gap to the chase group and then Cink was already 20, 30 seconds in the front of them. Then in the last lap I was able to catch Cink; it was a crazy battle. A really hard last lap.

"On the first lap I focused on getting back to the top five, then I saw Julien was coming quite strong from the back and I was more focused on that. Then on the last lap I saw maybe there is a chance to win the race ... and it was unbelievable race today.

"It is really tough for us athletes [the altitude]; if you want to go over your limit, you feel it for the next whole lap. It is different from racing at sea level definitely, and you have to be careful to not go too long in your red zone.

"This is a great victory, my tenth World Cup victory and now a big step to the World Cup win for the season. I am really lucky for this victory."

Schurter extended his lead significantly in the overall World Cup standings, since none of the other top contenders made the top five at Vallnord. At 820 points with two races remaining, Schurter leads round one winner Daniel McConnell (Trek Factory Racing) by 280 points, with Absalon another 30 points back, tied with Cink.

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