The 2024 UCI Indoor Cycling World Championships will take place this weekend (25-27 October) in Bremen, Germany, with more than 15,000 spectators expected for the three days of cycle-ball and artistic cycling competition.
Always the force to be reckoned with, the German team has particularly high hopes for this home edition, which will see the participation of athletes from 23 nations.
"We want to win all the titles and everyone should go home with a medal," says the German national artistic cycling coach Dieter Maute (Albstadt-Tailingen). His colleague, cycle-ball coach Jörg Latzel (Hameln), also wants to achieve two UCI World Championship titles.
Men’s cycle-ball: are Kopp and Mlady unbeatable?
"Raphael Kopp and Bernd Mlady are unbeatable on a good day," says Latzel, convinced of the quality of the newly formed ‘super team’. Bernd Mlady and his cousin Gerhard collected six UCI World Championship medals from 2016 to 2022, including two golds.
Raphael Kopp also became UCI World Champion with his cousin André last year. With the retirement of their respective teammates, Bernd Mlady and Raphael Kopp have joined forces and are already enjoying success: "We were aware that we would be playing at the top," reflects Kopp, summing up the past months. "Nevertheless, we were a bit surprised ourselves that we harmonised perfectly so quickly."
Their fiercest opponents are the 2022 UCI World Champions Patrick Schnetzer and Stefan Feurstein (Dornbirn/AUT) and Switzerland, whose brothers Benjamin and Severin Waibel (Pfungen) won silver in 2021 and bronze in 2022. However, Benjamin is currently injured and will be replaced by Jön Muller in Bremen. But France, Japan and Czechia could prove to be stumbling blocks on the way to titles and medals.
Five nations contest the women's cycle-ball
In the women's event, five nations will compete after the competition’s premiere in Glasgow, Scotland (Great Britain) in 2023, in which only Germany and Japan participated. Judith Wolf and Danielle Holzer (Hofen/Prechtal) are competing for defending champion Germany. "They are a very good team and narrowly prevailed (for selection) against the reigning UCI World Champions Claire Feyler and Nadine Weber from Merklingen," said Latzel. Runners-up from 2023, Japan also send a new team with Nana Yamashita and Saki Tanaka. Newcomers are Austria, Czechia and Switzerland.
Artistic cycling favourites
With Germany’s strength in depth, coach Dieter Maute can afford to assign the role of reserve rider to the reigning UCI World Champion Ramona Dandl (Bruckmühl) in the Single Women category after she finished only third in the national qualifying series. Two-time UCI World Championships silver medallist Lara Füller (Poppenweiler) and 2022 UCI World Champion Jana Pfann (Bruckmühl) will start for Germany. "Of course I want to win," says Pfann, who is seeded first with the highest difficulty. In view of the strong competitors Füller, and the two two-time UCI World Championship bronze medallists Alessa Hotz (SUI – 2021 and 2022) and Lorena Schneider (AUT – 2019 and 2023), Jana Pfann knows that no one can afford to make a mistake.
There will also be a new UCI World Champion team in ACT4. The reigning UCI World Champions from Switzerland – Stefanie Moos, Vanessa Hotz, Flavia Schürmann and Carole Ledergerber (Baar) – will not start and will instead end their careers together at the UCI World Cup final on 2 November. The new Swiss Champions Stefanie Haas, Valerie Unternährer, Selina Niedermann and Sarah Manser (Uzwil) will represent their country in Bremen.
They will fight for gold with the German team from Mainz-Ebersheim. This quartet from the host country, the 2022 UCI World Champions and runners-up last year, will compete with replacement Svenja Kraus after Annika Rosenbach suffered a broken collar bone mid-season. The modified team has already enjoyed success, with Kraus, Milena Schwarz, Tijem Karatas and Stella Rosenbach winning the Nationals and securing the UCI World Championship starting place for the third time in a row. Last year’s bronze medallists Austria return this year, and go into the event with a significant lead over the fourth team in the competition, France.
Kohl: “I want to start with a smile and to leave with a bigger smile"
In the Single Men, defending UCI World Champion Lukas Kohl (Kirchehrenbach) would like to see a competition at the very highest level. "It would be great if my competitors presented high scores," says the seven-time UCI World Champion and world record holder. His opponents, UCI World Championships silver-medallist Philipp-Thies Rapp (Tailfingen/GER) and three-time bronze medallist Emilio Arellano (ESP) are both in a position to stay above the 200 mark. "Then the tension in the hall would be particularly high. I feel that and that spurs me on," Kohl said.
A win would mean he equals the record of fellow German David Schnabel (eight UCI World titles between 2005 and 2014), but that holds little importance for Kohl: "I don't care about statistics. For me, it's about my own performance. I want to start with a smile and to leave the parquet with a bigger smile." Meanwhile, Yat Nam Chan (HKG) has an outside chance for a medal.
In the Pairs Open, Lea-Victoria Styber and Nico Rödiger (Langenselbold, GER) are the clear favourites. After three silver medals in a row, they want to succeed six-time UCI World Champions Serafin Schefold and Max Hanselmann (GER), who have retired. Niklas Kreuzmann and Celine Stapf (Soden, GER) will be in the mix at their UCI World Championship debut. Also competing will be two pairs from Hong Kong: last year’s bronze medallists Tsz Hin Jeff Lim and Tsz Leung Ron Lim and fourth-placed Chun Wai Hui and Chun Yin Hui.
The cards will be completely reshuffled in the Pairs Women. Of the four top-seeded couples, only Swiss Simona Lucca and Larissa Tanner (Stäfa) have UCI World Championships experience. They finished fifth in 2023. The shooting stars of the season, Henny Kirst and Antonia Bärk (Bonn-Duisdorf, GER), are the favourites. The 2022 European Championships runners-up went their separate ways last year, reunited in 2024 and successfully contested the season with the German National title and victory in the UCI World Championships qualifiers.
For the second German team, Kim Leah Schlüter and Nele Jodeleit (Knetterheide), and the Swiss duo of Jeannine Graf and Nadine Zuberbühler (Amriswil) it is also the first UCI World Championships.
The action from Bremen will be streamed live: