“We’re pretty much at zero”
Recovered chessman chases old form for new contract
January 29, 2024, 2:16 p.m
In 2020 and 2021, Maximilian Schachmann won the cycling classic Paris-Nice. He is the figurehead of German cycling and his Bora-hansgrohe team. Then Corona throws him off track. Now he is finally fit again – just in time for the approaching end of his contract.
After all, purely geographically, Maximilian Schachmann is on the sunny side of life. In the mild Spanish winter, the once best German professional cyclist prepared for a groundbreaking season; in the slightly warmer Saudi Arabia it begins on Tuesday. After two years of the epidemic, the 30-year-old’s priority is to continue racing and stay healthy.
“He’s had really, really tough years behind him and we’re pretty much at zero. We hope that things will gradually go in the right direction, but I don’t want to put him under pressure,” says Ralph Denk, team boss of Bora-hansgrohe. That’s why Schachmann is starting the season without pressure to produce results and without long-term planning: “We’ll see how the first third develops. I would be very happy if he gets back to where he was before.”
“Definitely rushed it.”
Schachmann has long been the figurehead for Denk and German cycling. The Berliner won Paris-Nice twice, was stage winner at the Giro d’Italia, twice German champion, and came third in the tough Ardennes classics Amstel Gold Race and Liège-Bastogne-Liège. Then the plug was pulled. “I’m not a doctor, but it’s as if he’s been sick all the time since the Olympic Games in Tokyo,” says sports director Rolf Aldag.
Schachmann’s immune system keeps failing and slowing him down. The team also had its share in this, as Aldag admits: “There were situations in which we definitely rushed things and had to say in hindsight: Okay, he should have trained longer instead of sending him to races.” Schachmann’s nonsensical start at the Classic de Panne in March 2023 is likely to be an example of this.
Aldag describes it as a miracle “that he still has the spirit.” What gives Schachmann his fighting spirit is, above all, his body. It’s slowly working again the way he wants it to. Over the past year he has consulted several doctors and through blood tests found out what was wrong. “For me it wasn’t like I shook myself once and then it went on,” says Schachmann. “Maybe it was also the wrong way to deal with Corona, we don’t know. That was completely new. Nobody knew how to deal with it correctly.”
Saudi Arabia instead of Paris-Nice
In the fall it hit him again, as Aldag reports. “The fourth infection, just before we start the training camp,” says the ex-professional. But this time Schachmann quickly got over the setback and was physically fine. “I’m healthy now. That’s the basic prerequisite for a good year. I have a different coach, the collaboration is really good,” says Schachmann.
While he would have previously prepared for Paris-Nice, he is now taking part in the Alula Tour in Saudi Arabia, which is not particularly important in terms of sport, at the same time. That’s just how business is. “If you drive fast, you drive in the big races. If not, then you don’t,” says Schachmann. He doesn’t sound frustrated. Rather, the good feeling of being a real professional cyclist again predominates.
His contract with Bora-hansgrohe expires at the end of the season. “This is certainly not an easy situation for him,” says Denk. But his protégé only wants to deal with the things that he can influence himself. “Of course I want to drive well and successfully. But I wanted that at all times in my career,” says Schachmann. Purely biologically, he is currently in his prime as a cyclist. On the sunny side of sport, so to speak.