Schöfflisdorf, Switzerland will always be home for Noemi Rüegg.
The reigning Tour Down Under champion and Swiss Olympian spends most of her racing season on the move, traveling from grand tour to Monument on the Women’s WorldTour, but whenever she has time to train and rest, she goes back to her sleepy Swiss village. Being close to her family and the friends who knew her long before she became a global superstar is more important to Noemi than hanging out in fancy cafés. The record books for her local climbs might not be a who’s who of her WorldTour rivals, but Noemi’s friends from Velo Club Steinmaur have supported her ever since she was a little girl, tearing around the farmers’ fields near Schöfflisdorf with her brother to practice for her first cyclocross races. The roads around Noemi’s house are beautiful and very quiet. Whenever the racing season gets hectic, Noemi goes home to Schöfflisdorf to pedal for hours in peace on her favorite pristine Swiss asphalt.
“I grew up here,” Noemi said. “I've been here ever since I was born, so it's a pretty special place for me. It’s really home. I love being close to my family and being able to see them often. And I really love the nature here. You start your ride and you're immediately in nature, and you can ride for many hours without a lot of traffic. You can do a lot of climbs, but we also have flat roads. It's very diverse. And it's not in the city, so it's really calm, even though you still have everything you need around, like supermarkets. It is kind of in a valley, so a lot of people are just driving through to get somewhere else.”
Schöfflisdorf will never be an in-between place for Noemi. Her village centers her and keeps her grounded.
“With the racing, we're away from home for many, many days each year,” she said. “That is why it's really important for me to have a place that really feels like home. When I'm home, I am really at home. It’s important to have these periods where I can train here. The more I'm away from home, the more easily I crack mentally. It makes me really tired to be away for more than three or four weeks in a row. So I really love to come back often and recharge the batteries. For me, this is where I can recharge the best and gain new motivation and be fresh again for the next block of training or racing.”
During spring in Schöfflisdorf, the hills are decked with apple blossoms. By summer, fresh cut grass roasts in the hot sun, as cowbells ring out over the fields. Autumn is harvest time. Noemi rolls along with the tractors on misty roads through falling red and yellow leaves. Winters are tougher, but Noemi’s never been afraid of the cold. She bundles up into her ASSOS kit and heads out into the cold fog or snow.
“It does snow, but not too much,” Noemi said. “So, whenever we get snow, it normally disappears after a few days, and it's never so much that you wouldn't be able to ride outside anymore. It just gets really cold. Sometimes, I will split the training and do half outside, half indoors. But it's not like the weather stops you from riding outside. It does take a bit more effort to go out mentally and physically, but I think that also can turn into a strength. I think that these trainings make you a lot stronger, because riding four hours at zero degrees compared to riding four hours in 20 degrees is a lot different, and that makes you resilient.”
On a cold winter’s day, Noemi took us out on one of her favorite rides around Schöfflisdorf. On the hilly loop out and around the Cheisacher Bergkupp in the Aargau Jura, Noemi showed us where she honed her Tour Down Under winning attack and where she raced – and won – her second-ever cyclocross race.
Noemi's route
“It includes a lot of climbing and a lot of nice little roads without a lot of traffic,” Noemi said. “It also uses a lot of the roads that I used to train when I started cycling. I used to go out on the bike a lot with my dad and just ride along those roads, up and down. Whenever one climb is finished, you go down, and then you can go up again and you can do this basically forever. That's why I really like it. In the end, we stopped at the cyclocross place where I did my second-ever race. I used to train there a lot with my family and friends on the cyclocross bike. That’s how I came into the sport and had my first training sessions. And then we went to a little farmer's shop that is really popular around here, where the farmers sell their products. We grabbed some fresh eggs and jam and took them back home.”
Join Noemi Rüegg, beyond your universe, in her hometown of Schöfflisdorf, Switzerland.