(Reuters) – Next month’s Road World Championships in Aigle-Martigny in Switzerland has been cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic, cycling’s governing body UCI announced on Wednesday.
The championships was scheduled to be held from Sept. 20 to 27 and the UCI said it would not be possible to stage it during those dates because of the Swiss Federal Council’s ordinance banning events uniting more than 1000 people until Sept. 30.
“The Union Cycliste Internationale takes note of the Swiss Federal Council’s decision – linked to the current COVID-19 pandemic – to maintain, until Sept. 30, the ban on events uniting more than 1000 people,” UCI said in a statement https://www.uci.org/inside-uci/press-releases/the-uci-provides-update-on-2020-uci-road-world-championships.
“Given this decision, the organising committee… and the political authorities of the cantons concerned have sadly estimated that the conditions could no longer be met to host the event scheduled to take pace in Aigle (Vaud) and Martigny (Valais).
“The UCI therefore acknowledges that the 2020 UCI Road World Championships will not take place in Aigle-Martigny.”
The UCI said it would work to find an alternative venue for the 2020 edition, with the priority being in Europe and on the dates scheduled.
“The UCI will look for a host city that would be able to provide a route as challenging as that in Aigle-Martigny and which would therefore suit the same type of riders who had initially planned to participate in Switzerland,” UCI said.
(Reporting by Shrivathsa Sridhar in Bengaluru, editing by Pritha Sarkar)
