In Oisans, France, Multivan-Merida teammates Ralph Näf and Gunn-Rita Dahle-Flesjaa won their respective Marathon World Championships.
While Dahle outclassed her competitors, winning by a margin of more than eight minutes, Näf rode a tactically perfect race, distancing second-placed Colombian Leonardo Paez by about a minute. At the finish, Näf could not believe his victory, having tears in his eyes as he was interviewed by TV stations. He had controlled the men’s race from the start, riding with Thomas Frischknecht and Christoph Sauser in the very beginning. Frischknecht had to let the leaders go early on, and Sauser even dropped out of the race due to a mechanical. So it was Colombia’s marathon specialist Leonardo Paez who joined Näf in leading the race – but he could not match the Swiss rider’s speed on the descents. "Everything went perfectly for me: The course, the weather and the tactics all simply fitted in", Näf said at the finish.
