{"id":952399,"date":"2026-10-30T22:18:12","date_gmt":"2026-10-30T22:18:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/952399\/"},"modified":"2026-10-30T22:18:12","modified_gmt":"2026-10-30T22:18:12","slug":"thomus-maxon-signs-first-non-swiss-rider-and-its-a-big-one","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/952399\/","title":{"rendered":"Thomus Maxon signs first non-Swiss rider (and it&#8217;s a big one)"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Thomus Maxon has traditionally been a Swiss squad. That limitation hasn\u2019t stopped the squad from excelling on the World Cup circuit, it would be hard to imagine a deeper pool of talent than the Swiss mountain bike program. But that all changes in 2027. The team has a big new signing, both figuratively and literally.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/Charlie-Aldridge-Colin-Field-26.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-130125\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/Charlie-Aldridge-Colin-Field-26.jpg\" alt=\"Aldridge all alone at the finish line in Quebec. Photo: Colin Field\" width=\"1200\" height=\"800\"  \/><\/a>Aldridge all alone at the finish line in Quebec in 2025. Photo: Colin Field<br \/>\nCharlie Aldridge &amp; Co.<\/p>\n<p>Charlie Aldridge will join Thomus Maxon for 2027. The big British rider comes over after a very strong season with Cannondale Factory Racing. That included European championships, in XCO and XCC, a World Cup win at Lake Placid and several podiums along the way. Aldrige will be the first international rider to join the squad.<\/p>\n<p>All of those results mattered not, as the powerhouse Cannondale squad had already decided to fold at the end of the season. So Aldridge needed a new home.<\/p>\n<p>A new look to a powerhouse squad<\/p>\n<p>Thomus Maxon decided the time was right to expand beyond its national borders. The two joined forces.<\/p>\n<p>It\u2019s not just Aldridge, though. With him comes his entourage. Phil Dixon joins as Sport Director and Kenta Gallagher as a technical coach also move over to Ralph N\u00e4f\u2019s Swiss squad.<\/p>\n<p>Thomus Maxon is already a powerhouse squad, of course. Alessandra Keller is a perpetual podium threat and past world champion. Mathias Flueckiger has long been one of Switzerland\u2019s top cross country talents. Young siblings Nicolas Halter and Monique Halter earned matching rainbow bands at 2026 world championships. It will be interesting to see how the new U.K. influence changes the look and results of the team.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/Cole-Punchard-Decathlon-Ford-2027--scaled.jpeg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-149325\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/Cole-Punchard-Decathlon-Ford-2027--scaled.jpeg\" alt=\"Cole Punchard in Decathlon Ford \/ Van Rysel bike launch video\" width=\"2560\" height=\"1600\"  \/><\/a>Cole Punchard joined Decathlon Ford for 2027, with a very \u2026 interesting\u2026 launch theme.<br \/>\nCannondale relocation program<\/p>\n<p>Aldridge is the latest ex-Cannondale rider to announce a new team for the upcoming season. Canada\u2019s <a href=\"https:\/\/cyclingmagazine.ca\/mtb\/cole-punchard-and-luca-martin-listed-as-decathlon-ford\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Cole Punchard and double World Cup overall winner Luca Martin move over to Decathlon Ford<\/a>. Jolanda Neff <a href=\"https:\/\/cyclingmagazine.ca\/mtb\/jolanda-neff-opens-new-options-with-jump-to-fenix-premier-tech\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">moves to a multi-disciplinary Fenix-Premier Tech team<\/a>, opening up more road and cyclocross racing for her season.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Thomus Maxon has traditionally been a Swiss squad. That limitation hasn\u2019t stopped the squad from excelling on the&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":952400,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[445],"tags":[49,48,103965,635,1700,62722,82,267914],"class_list":["post-952399","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-cycling","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-charlie-aldridge","tag-cycling","tag-mtb-features","tag-mtb-news","tag-sports","tag-thomus-maxon"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/952399","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=952399"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/952399\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/952400"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=952399"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=952399"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=952399"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}