Overall UCI World Cup series winners, Olympic gold medallists and up-and-coming prospects involved in the latest transfers during the Cross-country off-season. 

The off-season transfer window continues apace, and with us now deep into January, it’s starting to become clearer who will be riding for whom in the 2025 WHOOP UCI Mountain Bike World Series. 

While there were a number of big moves announced at the tail end of 2024, the new year kicked off an explosion of announcements with old contracts expiring, new contracts signed and a flurry of fresh team kits to show off. 

The transfer merry-go-round kicks off with Jenny Rissveds – the second Olympic champion to switch teams off-season, following Tom Pidcock’s move to Q36.5 Pro Cycling. The 2016 Rio gold medallist and bronze winner at Paris 2024 will be joining the Canyon CLLCTV Factory XC Team for the 2025 season, after the 30-year-old Swede’s previous team of the last three years – Team 31 – announced it wouldn’t be part of the circuit this year. 

Canyon CLLCTV Factory XC Team Manager, Sébastien Francois, said: “We’re beyond excited to welcome Jenny to the Canyon family. Her incredible career and fearless approach to racing align perfectly with our mission to support riders at the very top of the support.” 

Rissved will fill the gap in the German team left by Loana Lecomte – the 2021 UCI Cross-country World Cup overall winner moving from Canyon to BMC Factory Racing. The 25-year-old Frenchwoman looked back to her best at the conclusion of the 2024 UCI WHOOP Mountain Bike World Series, clinching her 11th UCI Cross-country Olympic (XCO) World Cup last time out in Mont-Sainte-Anne (Quebec, Canada), and will line up at the Swiss team alongside compatriots Jordan Sarrou and Titouan Carod. 

The other UCI XCO World Cup winner on that day in Canada was Alan Hatherly, who has unveiled a multi-discipline and team approach for the 2025 season. The South African 2024 overall winner will compete for Jayco AlUla on the tarmac and will join the Australian outfit’s bike partner’s team, Giant Factory Off-Road, for UCI World Cups. 

Alan Hatherly said: “I am incredibly excited for this new chapter in my cycling career and very grateful for the opportunity to ride for [Team Jayco AlUla ownership group] GreenEDGE Cycling for the next two seasons. Combining road and MTB is new and refreshing, and I am really looking forward to where this journey can go.”

Hatherly isn’t the only rider in the pits who will be juggling the rough stuff with racing on tarmac in 2025. The reigning three-time UCI Cross-country Marathon World Champion Mona Mitterwallner has joined the Women’s WorldTour team Human Powered Health, while Specialized Factory Racing’s Laura Stigger has signed a one-year contract with SD Worx-Protime for any drop bar action. Stigger has previous experience in the discipline, winning the UCI Junior Road World Championships in 2018.

Mona Mitterwallner said: “I want to become the best cyclist in the world, so I’ve always said road racing is part of my future. It was always on my radar and now after the Olympics, I wanted to try something new. I wanted to get out of my old routine and see if I could improve as a rider.

“I wanted a new challenge and to develop myself. I love climbing. In MTB you’re climbing for two or three minutes but in road racing you do it for over an hour. That’s something I want to try and I think I will be good at.” 

Laura Stigger said: “It was super special to immediately take the UCI Junior World Title in my own region at my first real introduction to the road. I am now curious to see what I am worth in the elite category on the road. 

“It's nice that I can discover that while I can still continue my mountain bike career with the Specialized Factory Racing Team.”

Hatherly and Mitterwallner’s old team, Cannondale Factory Racing, meanwhile are backing 23-year-old Scotsman Charlie Alridge to fill the South African’s shoes and have added experience and expertise in the form of three-time UCI XCO World Cup overall series winner Jolanda Neff. The pair are joined by up-and-comers Ana Santos, Cole Punchard and Under 23 UCI XCO World Champion Luca Martin. 

One rider who won’t be competing using Cannondale’s distinctive single-leg Lefty fork is Simon Andreassen. The Danish five-time UCI World Cup winner joins fellow new additions Rebecca Henderson and Jennifer Jackson at Orbea Fox Factory Team. 

Jackson’s old outfit, Liv Factory Racing, meanwhile have retained Linda Indergand and Ronja Blochlinger, while adding Marin Lowe and Tyler Jacobs to their U23 roster. 

Elsewhere, up-and-coming French talent Olivia Onesti has gone to BH Coloma Team, German rider David List has boosted Decathlon Ford Racing’s ranks, and the 32-year-old veteran Julien Schelb has joined WHOOP UCI Mountain Bike World Series commentator Bart Brentjen’s team KMC Ridley. 

Finally, 2025 will see some new teams join the UCI World Cup ranks. Kate Courtney will compete as a privateer under the name of her foundation, She Sends Racing – the former UCI World Champion and UCI World Cup overall winner building her own program after she was released by Scott-SRAM MTB Racing Team in December. 

French manufacturer Origine brings its own factory team to the world stage with its Origine Racing Division (although the team roster is still to be announced), while another French outfit Lapierre has had a shake up and will be the sole sponsor of the renamed Lapierre Racing Unity. Swiss 23-year-old Noëlle Buri is the only survivor from the old Lapierre Mavic Unity team but is joined by a combination of experience and youth in the form of Anton Cooper, Clara Teocchi, Maximilian Brandl, Tobias Lillelund and Nina Graf.