Most of the best mountain bike riders will be in Pal Arinsal, with many XCO riders having raced just a few weeks ago at Paris 2024.
The top six from the men’s event in Paris, including medallists Tom Pidcock, Victor Koretzky, and Alan Hatherly, will all be in action in the men’s elite XCO race in Andorra. Only Paris seventh-place finisher Riley Amos is missing out because the U.S. star is entered in the under-23 category, and athletes cannot compete in more than one age category at a world championships.
Swiss stars Nino Schurter and Matthias Flückiger, Italy’s Luca Braidot, Pidcock’s British compatriot Charlie Aldridge, France’s Jordan Sarrou, and New Zealand’s Samuel Gaze are some of the other top names in a stacked field hoping to take home the rainbow jersey.
It is a similar story on the women’s side, with the top nine from Paris all racing in Andorra, including podium finishers Pauline Ferrand-Prévot, Haley Batten, and Jenny Rissveds. Notably, Olympic champion Ferrand-Prévot has announced that this will be her career’s final mountain bike race before switching her focus to road racing.
Hungary’s Blanka Vas, who was tenth in the Paris XCO race and also finished fourth in the women’s road race, is the highest-placed finisher from the Olympics to not be present, while stars such as Puck Pieterse, Evie Richards and Kate Courtney – who did not race in Paris but were featured in the handover segment from Paris 2024 to LA 2028 – are due to compete.
In downhill, the current World Cup leader, Loïc Bruni of France, as well as reigning world champion Charlie Hatton of Great Britain on the men’s side, and women’s world champion and World Cup leader Valentina Höll of Austria, enter as the favourites.