2021 UCI Indoor Cycling World Championships: ACT4 the brilliant German opener

Friday saw a perfect start for the host nation of the 2021 UCI Indoor Cycling World Championships in Stuttgart (Germany): gold in artistic cycling ACT4, both Single Women qualified for the Final4, and an opening win in the cycle ball match against Belgium.

18 nations presented

After a spectacular opening ceremony with pyrotechnics and break dancers the 18 countries participating in the 2021 UCI Indoor Cycling World Championships were each presented individually by a flag bearer.

ACT4: path to success, and bowing out

The first highlight of these UCI World Championships was in the ACT4 artistic cycling. Germany was represented by the quartet of VfH Worms. Nora Erbenich, Sabrina Born, Annika Furch and Hannah Rohrwick, who had previously announced their retirement from competitive sports after their silver medal in 2019.

“Annika wanted to stop at that time,” says team captain Nora Erbenich. “But the other three of us were still tingling.” In the end, it was easy to convince Annika to continue. Even two forced breaks due to the Covid-19 pandemic could not dissuade the quartet from pursuing their ‘Project Stuttgart 2021’. After the bikes had to rest for a total of five months, the routine turned to training three times a week – wearing face masks and being regularly tested in the neighboring city of Ludwigshafen.

The past seven weeks, the quartet have been away from home every weekend: UCI World Championship qualification, the German Championships, the UCI World Cup final and ultimately on to the UCI World Championships.

“That was very exhausting,” says Sabrina Born, “but also good that the season went through continuously until the World Championships”.

The only time during that schedule that the four women did not show their best form was at the beginning of the German qualification several weeks ago when the riders admitted there were nerves.

“After the first competition, only the best five teams progressed in Germany,” explained Hannah Rohrwick. When this initial progression was achieved, the pressure dropped, even though the four competing teams were just as strong. “Everyone had the chance to win the ticket for Stuttgart,” emphasizes Erbenich. Eventually, it was the women from Worms who prevailed and delivered a fine performance to seal it.

"After the first practice session on Wednesday in the Porsche Arena, we were sure that we would have a good performance,” says Erbenich. In competition they were in the flow: no wobbling, no uncertainties – everything ran as if it was on rails. With 203.29 points, they clearly distanced the teams from Austria and Switzerland.

With this success, however, the final point has now been made and Erbenich, Born, Furch and Rohrwick agree: “We are definitely stopping now.” It couldn't be better: German Champions, UCI World Cup winners and now the UCI rainbow jersey with an almost perfect performance.

There was a thriller in the duel for second place. The mixed team Lea Schneider, Leonie Huber, Julia Wetzel and Lukas Schneider had a crash and small problems, and thus presented 177.46 points. The Swiss quartet of Nadine Bissegger, Laura Tarneller, Ronja Zünd and Fabienne Haas, who had looked set for silver, missed this mark by a razor-thin margin. They found themselves standing on the ground twice and in the end there was no time left for their final element and the result was 176.40 points and bronze medals.

Cycle ball: progression for favourites

The German team of Gerhard and Bernd Mlady recorded an important victory early in the cycle ball tournament. The cousins from Stein, faced Belgium and it was a 2:0 working victory for the silver medallists from 2019.

Likewise, the defending UCI World Champions Austria (Patrick Schnetzer and new partner Stefan Feuerstein/Dornbirn), completed their task against France with an expected 3:1 victory.

The match between Switzerland (Severin and Benjamin Waibel) and the Czech Republic saw the UCI World Championships newcomers Jan Havlicek and Robert Zvolamek contest their first match. But in the end, the Swiss prevailed 4:2.

Artistic Singles preliminaries

In artistic cycling single women, both German starters qualified for the Final to follow on Saturday afternoon. But both Lara Füller (177.81) at her UCI World Championship debut and the reigning UCI World Champion Milena Slupina (176.21) did not come through without challenges. Nevertheless, it was enough for the preliminary round double victory ahead of Lorena Schneider (AUT, 163.59) and Alessa Hotz (SUI, 154.79).

Artistic cycling and cycle-bass action continues on Saturday from 10am (CET).