Race of Truth Highlights Overall Leaders’ Strength at the SPAR Swiss Epic

While time trials on the road have become shorter in recent years, the Epic Series has used longer efforts against the clock to provide a unique challenge for the world’s best marathon mountain bikers. The 55-kilometre-long Stage 3 is 22 kilometres longer than the 33-kilometre effort the 2025 Tour de France presented on its fifth stage. It is 11 kilometres shorter, though, than the massive 66-kilometre trend-setting test presented by the Absa Cape Epic this year. The mid-race point of the SPAR Swiss Epic featured a course packed with singletracks, forest road climbs, and a long drag to the finish. Along with the 1 800 metres of descending, it tested with 1 200 metres of accumulated ascent, proving that it was not all downhill from the Bernina Pass to La Punt.

Setting off at 60-second intervals initially, before the stagger between the teams was increased to 90 seconds for the main contenders, the first team off the line was the MB Privateers Racing combination of Loris Brunet and Sabatier Thibault. The French pairing did not post a time, however, as they withdrew at the Sur Tegiatscha service station 29 kilometres into the stage. They were not the only withdrawals on the day; defending champions Lukas Flückiger and Gian Schmid, of Bixs Performance, did not start the time trial, nor did Scott Racing’s Andrea Siffredi after his Stage 2 crash.

The first team to lay down a marker for the time to beat was the SPAR pairing of Flavio Knaus and Aaron Imhof. Their effort of 2 hours and 11 minutes proved to be the 28th fastest time of the day, and was soon bettered. The first team to dip under the 2-hour mark was one of the pre-race favourites. Buff Megamo’s Wout Alleman and Martin Stošek have endured a difficult trip to Graubünden thus far, but a fifth place on the day will encourage them for the remaining two stages.

Giant Factory Off-Road’s Dario Lillo and Kevin Kuhn knocked Buff Megamo from the hotseat, but their time atop the standings was short-lived as Klimatiza Orbea went nearly a minute quicker. “It was a really nice one. I enjoyed it a lot. Yesterday’s rain made the trails perfect,” Samuele Porro smiled after posting a time of 1 hour, 58 minutes, and 48 seconds. “It was nice and warm, even on the top of the pass, and it wasn’t too windy up there either. We were able to work really well together today, pushing on the downhills without taking too many risks.”

Porro’s interview was barely over before the Torpado Kenda FSA team stormed across the finish line. Fabian Rabensteiner and Casey South had produced a masterclass of time trialling, passing their 1-minute team, KTM Spada powered by Brenta Brakes, on the trails. Their time of 1 hour, 57 minutes and 15 seconds was 1 minute and 14 seconds faster than the effort of Porro and Marc Stutzmann. Such was the race leaders’ dominance in fact that Nicolas and Lorenzo Samparisi, despite being passed by the Torpado Kenda FSA team, still finished with the third best time of the day.

“I just heard the time, so yeah, who wouldn’t be pleased!?” South enthused after securing his second stage win of the week alongside Rabensteiner.  “We don’t really talk, we just feel what the other guy needs,” he explained. “The tactic for today was to be safe on the downhill and not take any risks, then on the flats go full gas!”

“We are confident [going into the final two stages],” Rabensteiner mused. “Today we were able to catch back most of the time we lost [to Klimatiza Orbea] yesterday. We are looking forward to the next two days. But we need to concentrate and make sure we don’t make any mistakes.”