After hosting the first ever UCI Mountain Bike Marathon World Championships in Lugano in 2003, where mountain bike legend Thomas Frischknecht won the title, Switzerland will once again organize this competition. This long-planned project, launched as a collaboration between Grächen Tourism and Swiss Cycling, will allow the association to continue its work as it set out to do in 2013 when it designated Lenzerheide as the main venue for World Cup races and World Championships until 2018.

"This is great news for Swiss cycling," said a delighted Thomas Frischknecht, gold medal winner at the first UCI Mountain Bike Marathon World Championships in Lugano. "The fact that we are continuing to host international races is very important for the continuity of Swiss sport."

The course of these UCI Mountain Bike Marathon World Championships will be special because it partly runs over the last section of the Perskindol Swiss Epic Trail. "We are very pleased and motivated to be able to organize the UCI Mountain Bike Marathon World Championships in 2019," said Berno Stoffel, Head of Grächen Tourism. "We are convinced that the trails in Grächen and the region in the middle of the highest mountains in Switzerland guarantee extremely attractive mountain biking."Swiss Cycling is also delighted that this event has been awarded to Grächen. "This is the logical consequence of the strategy we have defined at the association and we are delighted to be able to host a new international event after the 2018 World Championships in Lenzerheide," said Thomas Peter, Head of Sport at Swiss Cycling. "Hosting international competitions in Switzerland is extremely important for the development of our athletes."Source: Press release