The Complete Guide to the 2023 World Cup XC Teams

 Oh god, here we go again…

 This article allows those of us who have folloewd this sport for years to have insight on who is on their way out, and who is on their way in, and what teams are actually in the hunt for a world cup win or title or podium win as well as world champs. It also give us insight on how the olympics will be affected . As well las those of us who are fans of particular ridrrs or bike brands to know who will be riding what rigs this season. It also shows anyone from the Unired States just who are the top dogs from the states in this sport as wel as fans of certain riders form certain countries.

 She's just an instagram bike model now it seems.

 @wilsonians: 350k ig followers and that Porsche contract with Pfaff is probably more interesting than having to race every weekend

 @tgr9: Not knocking her success. Good on her for translating past racing prowess to success off the track. But yeah....she is more of an instagram model/ambassador now than a racer it seems. And yeah, the ability to do what you want, take bike trips etc. sounds way more interesting to me than the grind of a race season.

 The Canyon MTB team was not listed with Emily, Jenn Jackson and Laurie Arsenault

 Jenn and Laurie each announced on instagram in December that they were leaving the team.

Jenn went to Liv Factory Racing, Laurie went to "Pittstop Racing Team"

 Browser History?

 You have to pay to see it.

 @trailsquatch: Sounds like Discovery +

 Yeah. People may have forgotten that a year before Tokyo, Pidcock had never ridden in a MTB World Cup at all. In fact he'd ridden very few organised XCO races....(U23 Nationals in 2019)

I have no idea of Tulett will be any good, but he did something Tom didn't, and won 2 Junior CX World titles....He's a climber, and could well be suited to XCO.

 Social media is likely more lucrative than finishing 45th at UCI XCO event..

 If only Only Fans picked her up

 I would say yes, she is no longer listed in UCI MTB riders list.

 I’d argue Trek Factory is more stacked.

 We will all miss Warner

 @Southeast-Shredder: we all know our sport is not much "appreciated" worldwide. Even with all that mass watching on the big vueltas, year after year they struggle to get the bills paid. I think that, for those who don´t ride bikes, like us, is a pain in the ass to see 3-4 hours of road bikes, or 1:20 hour of XCO, where "nothing happens" and we have 5 to 10 tops fight for positions. Even F1 is strugling with this past decades. As I replied other post regarding bike prices vs motorbikes prices, we are in a niche. How are you going to watch thru WBD there? We are stil not sure how we will here.

 ..

 Lars kept declining each season he was with Scott Sram. HE was in best form the first two seasons with them and won a European title with Scott-Sram, and also one Cape Epic as Nino's partner. But he had injuries and his performance kept geting worse for the most part instead of better. HIs performance atthe Cape Epic last time was aAndri F. and Lars were friends before he joined the team and even traiwful. He looked tired and couldn't keep up with the fastest guys on most of the days, especially after Nino put forth such A hstrong effort to tryto make up ground after suffering two flats on the first stage out. that wore Lars out and he never recovered. Andri F. the teams manger's son, knew Lars and trained together with him when Lars was still with BMC. Lars and the team had no falling out. He simply was performing less and less consistantly and not showing signs of improvement. Scott -Sram did well to pick up Filippo Colombo , as he is a very young and very talented rider to build up for the team's future. He's also Swiss so that helps the chemistry as well. Already at the Stellenbosch Cape xco race on February 5th, the Scott team took 1st, 2nd , and 3rd , which is pretty tough to do even though it was not a very deep field. There were people there who certainly had the potential to snag one or even two of the podium spots. It will be interesting to see how Colombo develops with Scott-Sram. I seriously doubt whether Lars will have better results at Thomus Racing. I hope he does as he's a genuine nice fellow and gets along with everyone pretty well. Thomas F. wrote a nice goodbye statement concerning Lars too. With Mathias Fluckiger 's ban lifted, it should be interesting to see these two teams race each other but I only see Scott being the stronger team .Mathias comes back after the ban ranked 24th whereas he was ranked number 3, so a third row starting postion instead of a front row position for at least the first world cup he enters.

 If Mathieu Van Der Poel comes back to XCO as expected, he will be a very high contender no doubt, as he has appeared very strong in cyclocross so far this season. Tom Pidcock on the Grenediers team, probably will be right up there with Mathieu Van Der Poel, and I wouldnt be surprised if Mathias Fluciger is in the top 5 after aa few outings. Filipo Colombo , a new member of Scotand of course Nino, Scott Sram should have some very good results. If last years results are any indication of this year, watch a guy on BH racing squad, and the tallest guy out there I believe, his name is David Serrano . I think he won a bronze at the olympics and last world cup season he has finished number 2 to Nino and maybe had one win, or two second place finishes I can't remeber exactly. Other riders to certainly watch in the men's elite class are Victor Koretsky, Sam Gaze, Ondre Cink, Of course Alan Hatherly from South Africa on Cannondale, Vital Albin, who performed well on a few outings last year, Sebastian Fini will be up there too I think. There's my list of men I think will be being consistantly and at the front of the pack at the end. I have some opinoins about the womens field as well and if you like I could share those with you if I havent bored you to death here.

 @Xcmtberbill: Don’t forget Vlad Dascalu, he will 100% win a World Cup if he is in the same shape as last year

 @Xcmtberbill @laupe Awesome!!! Thank you! Would love to know more about the women's side. I only know the usual suspects.

 @sevensixtwo: In the women’s field there are now many capable of winning. If Pauline ferand prevot has kept her form from last year, it will be hard stopping her from dominating this year. I hope evie richards is fully recovered from her back problems, so she can win som races, like in 2021. Others to look out for, who can win races are loana lecomte, Jenny rissveds, Anne terpstra, Alexandra Keller. Mona mitterwalner is probably looking at her first World Cup win, if she can have a clean race

 @laupe: It sounds like Neff and Courtney are not contenders anymore. Prevot is a beast.

 @sevensixtwo: I wouldn't count out Neff, she is olympic champion and won a WC last year, but i think she needs some luck to win. Courtney is slowly working her way up in the ranks, will be interesting to see if she can win some WC races

 Yeah, I agree completely as that's their house brand. But I have heard some great things about the Pirellis ( spelling?)
and look forward to see how they do, since they are gonna be on more riders' bikes this season. Also, Continental is pushing their tires . Julian Absalon used Contis and it got him world championships. I'm not sure if he got all 5 of his world championsships on Contis or not though. The conti race Kings have a very ow rolling reistnce too. Im not sure why they have been out of the forefront of racing the past 7 or so seasons. Would be interesting to find out why but I know Maxxis brand is everywhere and Nino's success with them propelled the brand to the stratosphere. Variety makes the racing more interesting in my opinion, so I'm stoked to see some changes even in tires used.

 @Xcmtberbill: with you on all of that. Right or wrong, I think of MTB brands in pairs:
Maxxis or Schwalbe
Shimano or SRAM
Fox or Rockshox

Obviously there are more choices, but those are the dominant ones and it’d be nice to get a few more options on equal footing.

Also I just got some Pirelli tires for my g***** bike. I haven’t mounted them up yet, but they *seem* great.

 I suspect that globally, xco is way bigger, more meny than DH

 @Madfella: XC gets tens of thousands of fans turning out to watch, downhill not even close in most cases.

 Yes.

 @AndrewFleming: Wonderful, thanks For a second I was afraid of not seeing her this year ^^

 I saw her listed as Bec Henderson in the Australian nationals this past weekend, wondered what was up with that.

 I'd love to see Nino notch another WC win to break the tie with Absalon.

 He has a contract with Scott until 2025, so we will see him race the 2024 Olympics

 Yeah what's up with this?

 Canyon CLLCTV Line Burquier, Thibaut Francois, Thomas Griot, Zabdiel Adair Gutierrez Prieto, Loana Lecomte, Withen Albert Philipsen, Luca Schwarzbauer The Canyon CLLCTV team remains an incredibly strong force on the XC circuit with Line Burquier, Loana Lecomte and Luca Schwarzbauer all securing great results in 2022. The team will be looking to build upon this success as it heads into its second season of racing.

 with Canyon, sad to see Massi as a middle team, I had high hopes Ulloa would help the team stay on top, after Lacomte left.

 Lecompte is with Canyon still. They aren't going to giver her up without a fight. She'll definatey be on the hunt this season.